It has been approximately a month since the beginning of the project and by that moment we, among other things:

• received the aluminium laser-cut base plate for the robot that we ordered from Metec.
• received the motors and wheel connectors that we ordered online from Pololu.
• made the “preliminary” wheels.
• received the parts necessary for the motor control circuit board and soldered them together.
• received the Bluetooth module ordered from Proto-PIC.
• programmed the motor circuit board to communicate via Bluetooth and drive the motors.

October 10th was the day when we put those things together for the first time and could test the driving. The video below shows the robot base, remote-controlled via Bluetooth using an XBox joystick. Looks fun, doesn’t it?

When we ordered the motors we were afraid they would not be fast enough. Well here they look faster than we need (although this is not even half the final weight of the robot). However, we have some problems, too. Namely, it seems that our motor circuit board cannot handle the motors at low speeds normally. A lot of tuning awaits.