The program listings, .Hex files and printed circuit board artwork for the Hexatron articles published in the November (Premier) and December 2003 issues of Servo magazine can be be downloaded here: hexatron2.zip

 

This in-depth article explains how to decode the signals from any infrared remote control for use in robotics and electronics applications. The support file for the "Infrared Remote Control Signal Analysis" article in the January 2005, Nuts And Volts magazine can be downloaded here: Williams.zip

The complete plans are available free here: Infrared project

 

The Jacob's ladder project ran in the December 2002  Nuts & Volts magazine. Building this fascinating high voltage device is a lot of fun! This Jacob's ladder project allows you to create the excitement of high voltage arcs safely on your desktop. The circuit is powered by a 12-volt DC battery pack and outputs over 30,000 volts. The circuit design allows the repetition rate of the high voltage pulses to be varied by a potentiometer on the front panel. Each time a high voltage pulse is triggered, the light emitting diode on the front panel is also activated. This educational project demonstrates the principles of high voltage and is also a great attention-getter. Join in the high voltage fun!

The complete plans and circuit board are available here: Jacobs Ladder

Download the free zipped article here: jacobs-ladder-article.zip

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I had the pleasure of attending the second annual Artbots Robot Talent Show held in New York City (www.artbots.org). The Robot Talent Show took place at the EYEBEAM Gallery (www.eyebeam.org) on July 12-13, 2003 as a part of EYEBEAM's summer robotics festival called ROBOT. The Artbots show featured the work of 22 artists and groups from six countries. It was a great success with over 2000 visitors, as well as local, national, and international press coverage in print, television, and on the web. EYEBEAM's goal is to, "engage a cultural dialog at the intersection of the arts and sciences and to forge an understanding of their relatedness".

The entire article was published in the January 2004 issue of Servo Magazine.
Read the entire article here:

The entire story was published in the February 2004 issue of Servo Magazine and can be downloaded free, in PDF format, here: ecrg.pdf

Visit the Eastern Canadian Robot Games webpage: www.robotgames.ca

The Eastern Canadian Robot Games (www.robotgames.ca) were held on November 15 and 16, 2003, at the Ontario Science Centre in Toronto Canada. There were 10 different categories of competition, with 150 robots created by close to 200 competitors who came to do battle from areas all over North America. There was a wide range of competitions from four different types of robot sumo, where the robots competed to push each other out of a ring, to fire fighting, where robots searched through a maze to extinguish small candles. The purpose of the robot games is for people to have fun working with robotics, which is a great bridge to all areas of science and technology. It gives them a chance to get experience with electronics, programming, design and mechanical construction by building real working robots that accomplish goals...

What is it that makes us human? Is it possible to create an artificial human - an android? The human body, including the brain, is one of the most sophisticated biological machines in existence. The design of the human body is so complex that to build comparable machines our technology will need to advance significantly. With our current understanding and technology we can only attempt to mimic the form of the human body since it is impossible to recreate it at this time. It is no wonder that man looks to nature for insight and inspiration when designing machines. The idea of "reverse engineering" humans has fascinated mankind for a long time. The concepts of how the human body functions have proven to be extremely complex. For example, the human hand and wrist are very complicated devices for grasping and moving objects but when implemented in machinery they must be simplified in order to keep the mechanics and control systems within a reasonable level of complexity...

The entire article, published in the March 2004 issue of servo magazine, can be downloaded here: hrdc.pdf

The complete plans (more detailed with corrections) and the circuit board are available here: Hexatron project

There is a correction to the wiring description of the potentiometers in the Hexatron article published in Servo Magazine. The middle wire needs to be connected to one of the outer terminals of the header connector. The values of the pots should also be 5K ohms.