Do not fear the search engine! 
http://lmgtfy.com/?q=define+short+circuit
It means you have electrical connections where you shouldn’t have them connected. It tends to burn things up when you do that. Make sure the places you solder on your board look like they do in the pictures shown above. The individual metal circles should not be connected together by any amount of solder or short circuits will occur.
Do this before worrying about anything else period.
Need Help
Hey, please help me on this project! When I copied the program out of here, all my robot did was move forward, then backwards, then forwards, then backwards…etc. Please tell me how to fix this!! 
This happens to all of us,
This happens to all of us, all the time.
What you do, is take one thing, a simple thing, and make sure it works. Then take the next. If you copy a complete program it almost certainly will not work right away, and this procedure cannot be recommended.
HELP
i think my camera short-circuited, its hot and starts to smell funky. Is there anyway i can fix this or do i have to get another camera? If so where?
First of all: Please read
First of all: Please read the rules, carefully!
Second, I am not sure why your camera is broke. At least it smells funky, that’s nice.
As a general rule: When electronics is short circuted is hot and smelling, they are broke, and you will have to buy a new part.
Most often the shop that sold you the original part can sell you a similar part.
I hope this helps.
hey can i use arduino uno r3
hey can i use arduino uno r3 instead of picaxe 28?
Need Help with Programming
Hello! I just finished building the robot, and the build went quite well. However, I am having trouble programming. I have a couple questions, and they mostly have to do with the Sharp IR Sensor.
1) I ordered the kit from Solarbotics, and the wire for the sharp it came with was red, black, and yellow. However, I have looked closely at the pictures and thought that the yellow wire was the white wire because they matched up where it connects to the sharp, but the wires get switched around on the other side. I am worried I might of plugged it in wrong and fried my Sharp. Could you please give me advice?
2) Whenever I enter in the program in the intructions and change the highs and lows to my wiring, when I program it, all my robot does is look both ways, then spin a tiny bit. Could you tell me what it wrong?
3) when I enter in
main:
readadc 0, b0
debug
goto main
a window pops up, and when I wave my hand in front of the sharp, it flickers between 124 and 135 for the ‘decimal’ column, but it does the same without my hand. Again, this probably has to do with my sharp. Could you help?
4) Lastly, this isn’t really a big deal but sometimes when I am testing my servo it randomly sets the middle “150” at random places. Like one time 150 is facing the front, and a few seconds later it is facing the side. Do you have any idea why?
Thanks you so much, I am new to this and robotics, and I really need help! Please reply as soon as possible.
Question
I am busy with a school project and we build this robot. But we where wondering is it possible to make this robot remote controlled? And what would be needed and how can it be done? Thanks in advance.
The easiest way to do it is
The easiest way to do it is to use the IRIN command on the robot and the IROUT on your remote control (which will use something like a PICAXE 08M2 or bigger). It uses the same infrared communication protocol that a Sony remote control uses. There is a more detailed explaination in the PICAXE manual 2. You will need another chip (the 08M2 or something suitable), an IR receiver like a TSOP38338, and an IR LED (and its current limiting resistor!) that matches the wavelength detection range of the receiver. In the TSOP38338’s case it likes the 940nm-ish range so look for an LED with that wavelength peak.
My examples link to Mouser because they take care of me but you can find the same kind of receiver and LED on ebay, Radioshack, and many many other places. For the receiver look for the three-pin variety, not the two pin, and with a 38kHz modulation/carrier frequency (it helps to block out background IR noise). Then look for its peak detection frequency in the specs and find an matching IR LED. Some like 940nm, some like 890nm. Either LED will work but it’s a matter of detection range, really.
In manual 2 it shows a circuit schematic for how to wire up the receiver but I’ve found it better to follow the schematic that the manufacturer suggests for whatever IR receiver you end up choosing. You can find it in the datasheet.
1) Yes, the white wire is
1) Yes, the white wire is equivalent to the yellow wire but the connector is set up in a servo configuration which will fry the Sharp IR sensor unless you do as Frits does in the tutorial and do some wire switcheroo-ing.
2) Something is awry. If you’re using Frits’s code than even the 124 and 135 that you say you get should not make it stop and go into avoidance mode. Which leads to…
3) It’s been awhile since I cooked a Sharp IR but it sounds like it might be toast. One test is to power the sensor and use your camera from your phone or whatever to see if the sensor LED still works. We can’t see IR but digital cameras can. IR shows up as a purple glow. If you don’t have a purple glow from one of the “eyes” on the sensor than it’s time for a sensor obituary.
4) The 150 refers to the pulse width of the signal that positions the servo and it isn’t something that changes from day to day or power-up to power-up. Hard to say what the problem is but it’s late and my brain is underpowered right now, however I will sleep on it.
I recommend taking a look at
I recommend taking a look at ignoblegnome’s Penny. It’s an Arduino Start Here Robot. It’s not going to be a direct plug-and-play code but a little tweaking of the pin assignments and making the .pde a .ino is all you really need to do.
Take note of how Frits
Take note of how Frits rewires the connector in the tutorial. Not following that step will lead to a fried sensor.
Thanks!
Thank you so much for all the advice! I rewired the Sharp wire correctly, and luckily it wasn’t fried! It works now, and I can see a purple glow from one of the ‘eyes’ whenever my robot is on. Everything works right, even the weird servo problem is fixed. Thanks once again!
Cost may vary for transreceiver
R/Dan M Sahib,
The second link given for $52 now displays $1.46.
New AXE010X2 and SRF-05
Hi,
I’m a new guy here with so many interests on this field. I want to start with this kit but I’ve researched a bit and I want to be 100% confident before buying one and I have just a couple questions right now.
First is the main chip, the PICAXE-28X1 which have been replaced by the new AXE010X2 (PICAXE-28X2), It’s more expensive but how much more could it cost if the shop change the 28X1 for the new 28X2? It is possible to order the kit replacing the older chip for the newer one?
Last question is basically the same, I’ve found the HY-SRF05 more convenient for what I’m planning for my very first robot, although the Sharp could be useful for some sort of things like “lack of floor to ride on” sensor (as long as there are no black surfaces down). Could I replace this component too?
I know I should be asking the shop first, but I wanted to do here first to see if you sense I’m going to fail using the 28X2 when there are almost no differences or maybe the SRF05 needs more power or it’s not fully compatible with picaxe (I think it is).
More advices are obviously welcome, I’m just downloading and reading a ton of PDFs but sometimes that little things you only learn by practising is what could make a big difference.
Thanks for all, I’ll fill my profile soon and upload some pics of my progress.
(Sorry for my english, I’m spanish!)
why frits had connected
why frits had connected shorting blocks and female wire and why it has left last
pin
is this right way
is this right way toconnect or in really i would to connet blocks to last one …or let it free…please help
IR Sensor not giving meaningful input.
Heya guys! I just got my LMR kit, and everything was going pretty good until I got to testing the IR sensor. I will admit that it took me a little while to decide how to put the wires in. It’s hard to see in the picture, but ended up cutting and swapping the red and yellow wires in the cable so the yellow (signal?) cable actually feeds into the middle/red wire on the board. and the red wire feeds into the yellow.
Nothing smells like it’s burning or anything, but when I run the above “readadc 1, b0” code, I get a window with all this blank input, except the entry for b0, which just fluctuates between 0 and 4 and back again. I tried looking at the ir sensor with my phone camera and… sadly I am not seeing any infrared glow.
Did I set something up wrong, or is my sensor just busted?
purchase
Yes, thanks for your comments regarding costs. How do I go about buying the infrared robot?
Thanks
Thanks for the awesome tutorial - I still can’t quite believe that a troglodyte like myself acually managed to build a functioning robot following your guide! The funny thing is, it took me longer to figure out how to get the axepad software to recognise the USB cable on my version of linux than it did to actually build the robot.
The only problem is, now I can’t stop thinking about the next project…
