Welcome to my Armored Rover project!
It’s not actually armored yet…and not fully armed even. That’s waiting on either my CNC to be finished or at least my dremel to come back home. Anywho, lets just say this is a work in progress and will be for a while. Its a stock lynxmotion 4wd that I picked up as an autonomous kit, then proceeded add a playstation remote. I added a platform on top, a single pin serial LCD (these things are great, every project should have one) and the fun part: two cannons and a laser sight.
Pictures: (soon!)
Video:
Cannons: These cannons are from Toyseast, cost around $50 for the pair with delivery to Canada. Two aren’t needed of course…but it’s even more awesome that way! There is a bit of a demo in general electronics that goes over how these work, but that uses a rc controlled pulsed relay to control them. Its a lot simpler to just use some transistors, most of us probably have bins of them laying around. Relays could work too. The laser I got on ebay for $5 from China. It’s intended for DJ’s actually, and runs off of 3 to 4.5V. I used the 0.3v drop from a transistor and added an additional diode to drop 0.7V, so it runs comfortably under limits at 4V even. The circuit for all this is attached. I didn’t bother to print a circuit or anything, just used protoboard.
the cannons have 4 wires, an orange and black pair, and a green and black pair. The orange and black pair get wired to the pins 1 and 2. These power the little hobby motors that wind the springs. One of the cannons I had to wire backwards strangely enough. The green and black go from 3 to 4. This is just a standard off the shelf limit switch hidden inside. When the spring is fully forward (just fired) this gets pressed. This is an easy way to stop the cannon after one shot, and keep the springs in a retracted position. I built the circuit with a double set of headers, so I just run the two cannons in parallel. I found one fired slightly faster than the other, so I used the slower cannon’s switch to turn them both off, and just cut the wires on the other. The laser is wired onto the pins below, and a 3 pin header goes out to the bot board to connect the I/O. I also have a 2 pin header to power the circuit.
Code: Again, a work in progress. I particularly like the serial read outs to debug EVERYTHING, my button presses, status bits, motor speeds etc. I’m driving the rover in tank mode, and will be using the L and R buttons to control the cannon aiming once I get some pan and tilts installed. The top L and R will aim up, the top and bottom R to aim right etc, with all 4 firing the cannon. This way you can drive and aim at once without losing any accuracy. I may have a button toggle so that the left joystick steers and right aims, but I tried it and couldn’t get my coordination together 
Pretty sad when you can’t drive your own bot!
'---------------------------------------------------------------------
'---------------------------------------------------------------------
'Sparky, the gunbot rover
'June 15th, 2010
'adding in display code, starting laser and gun controls
'need to add in servos for pan and tilt
'june 24th, 2010
'laser is working, code tweaked heavily and debugged
'gun is also firing, on temp control scheme.
'just needs the pan and tilts, and range sensors installed for obstacle detection?
'headlights still on order
'Kevin Cochran, hobby project
'bot board with basic atom pro and playstation 2 remote to drive
'4 wheel rover with laser aiming and airsoft guns
'---------------------------------------------------------------------
'---------------------------------------------------------------------
'pinouts
DAT con P12
CMD con P13
SEL con P14
CLK con P15
'pin 2 is serial lcd
'pin 4 is laser
'pin 5 is gun
'pin 6 is switch
laser con p4
gun con p5
low laser
low gun
'ps2 controls
index var byte
temp var byte(18)
mode var byte
'joystick positions
rhori var word
rvert var word
lhori var word
lvert var word
'motor speeds
lmotor var sword
rmotor var sword
boost var byte
'button depressing
circlelast var bit
squarelast var bit
trianglelast var bit
xlast var bit
'status bits
laseron var bit
gunswitch var bit
gunswitchlast var bit
'dispays
displaymode var byte
displaybutton var word
displayvalue var word
'---------------------------------------------------------------------
high CLK
test
low SEL
shiftout CMD,CLK,FASTLSBPRE,$1\8,$43\8,$0\8,$1\8,$0\8] ;Config Enable
high SEL
low SEL
shiftout CMD,CLK,FASTLSBPRE,$01\8,$44\8,$00\8,$01\8,$03\8,$00\8,$00\8,$00\8,$00\8] ;Set Mode and Fix(Analog
high SEL
pause 100
low SEL
shiftout CMD,CLK,FASTLSBPRE,$01\8,$4D\8,$00\8,$00\8,$01\8,$ff\8,$ff\8,$ff\8,$ff\8] ;Vibration Enable
high SEL
low SEL
shiftout CMD,CLK,FASTLSBPRE,$01\8,$4F\8,$00\8,$FF\8,$FF\8,$03\8,$00\8,$00\8,$00\8] ;Enable Pressure
high SEL
low SEL
shiftout CMD,CLK,FASTLSBPRE,$01\8,$43\8,$00\8,$00\8,$5A\8,$5A\8,$5A\8,$5A\8,$5A\8] ;Press_trans_start
high SEL
low SEL
shiftout CMD,CLK,FASTLSBPRE,$01\8,$43\8,$00\8,$00\8,$00\8,$00\8,$00\8,$00\8,$00\8] ;Config Exit
high SEL
main
' This section find the mode the PSX controller is in.
low SEL
shiftout CMD,CLK,FASTLSBPRE,$1\8]
shiftin DAT,CLK,FASTLSBPOST,[mode\8]
high SEL
low SEL
' asking data to PS2 controller
shiftout CMD,CLK,FASTLSBPRE,$1\8,$42\8]
' reading data from controller
shiftin DAT,CLK,FASTLSBPOST,[temp(0)\8,temp(1)\8,temp(2)\8,temp(3)\8,temp(4)\8,temp(5)\8,temp(6)\8,temp(7)\8,temp(8)\8, |
temp(9)\8,temp(10)\8,temp(11)\8,temp(12)\8,temp(13)\8,temp(14)\8,temp(15)\8,temp(16)\8,temp(17)\8,temp(18)\8]
high SEL
'---------------------------------------------------------------------
'temp 3-6 are joysticks
'temp 7-10 are d-pad buttons
'11=triangle 12=circle 13=X 14=square
'15=L1 16=r1 17=L2 18=R2 255 is full on, 0 is off
' this section takes the status of circle, if on, double the speed
if (temp(12) >10) and circlelast = 0 then
if (boost = 1) then
boost = 2
elseif (boost = 2 or boost = 0)
boost = 1
endif
circlelast = 1
elseif temp(12) = 0
circlelast = 0
endif
'---------------------------------------------------------------------
' this section will control servo position using L & R buttons -interrupts?
'---------------------------------------------------------------------
' this section toggles laser using square button
' if button is on (one shot) trigger laser state
if (temp(14) >10) and squarelast = 0 then
if laseron = 1 then
low laser
laseron = 0
else
high laser
laseron = 1
endif
squarelast = 1
elseif temp(14) = 0
squarelast = 0
endif
'---------------------------------------------------------------------
' this section fires the gun, using X for now
' if button is on (one shot) trigger laser state
'input switch
;if switch is off and was on last
'turn off gun
'switch last is off
'if switch was not off, turn on from last time
'logic all reversed!
gunswitch = in6
if gunswitch = 0 and gunswitchlast = 1 then
low gun
gunswitchlast = 0
elseif gunswitch = 1
gunswitchlast = 1
endif
if (temp(13) >10) and xlast = 0 then
xlast = 1
high gun
elseif temp(13) = 0
xlast = 0
endif
'---------------------------------------------------------------------
'prep the inputs to be displayed to screen. this is debugging more than anything
if (temp(11) >10) and trianglelast = 0 then
trianglelast = 1
displaymode = displaymode + 1
elseif temp(11) = 0
trianglelast = 0
endif
if displaymode = 1 then
if temp(11)>0 then
displaybutton = "^" 'triangle
displayvalue = temp(11)
elseif temp(12)>0
displaybutton = "O" 'circle
displayvalue = temp(12)
elseif temp(13)>0
displaybutton = "X" 'x
displayvalue = temp(13)
elseif temp(14)>0
displaybutton = "=" 'Square
displayvalue = temp(14)
else
displaybutton = " " 'blank
displayvalue = 0
endif
serout 2,i9600,[254] 'send command
serout 2,i9600,[128] 'send position to move to
serout 2,i9600,"button ", displaybutton, " pressed"] 'write the text
serout 2,i9600,[254]
serout 2,i9600,[192]
serout 2,i9600,"force = ", dec3 displayvalue\3, "/255"]
elseif displaymode = 2
if boost = 1 then
serout 2,i9600,[254]
serout 2,i9600,[128]
serout 2,i9600,"Boost Enabled "]
else
serout 2,i9600,[254]
serout 2,i9600,[128]
serout 2,i9600,"Boost Disabled "]
endif
if laseron = 1 then
serout 2,i9600,[254]
serout 2,i9600,[192]
serout 2,i9600,"Laser Enabled "]
else
serout 2,i9600,[254]
serout 2,i9600,[192]
serout 2,i9600,"Laser Disabled "]
endif
elseif displaymode = 3
'put something on motor speeds here?
if lvert < 80 then
serout 2,i9600,[254] 'send command
serout 2,i9600,[128] 'send position to move to
serout 2,i9600,"l: forward ", dec3 lvert\3]
elseif lvert > 200
serout 2,i9600,[254]
serout 2,i9600,[128]
serout 2,i9600,"l: reverse ", dec3 lvert\3]
else
serout 2,i9600,[254]
serout 2,i9600,[128]
serout 2,i9600,"l: stopped ", dec3 lvert\3]
endif
if rvert < 80 then
serout 2,i9600,[254] 'send command
serout 2,i9600,[192] 'send position to move to
serout 2,i9600,"r: forward ", dec3 rvert\3]
elseif rvert > 200
serout 2,i9600,[254]
serout 2,i9600,[192]
serout 2,i9600,"r: reverse ", dec3 rvert\3]
else
serout 2,i9600,[254]
serout 2,i9600,[192]
serout 2,i9600,"r: stopped ", dec3 rvert\3]
endif
else
displaymode = 0
endif
'---------------------------------------------------------------------
' this section does the mixing for throttle steering on a diff steered vehicle.
rhori = (temp(3))
rvert = (temp(4))
lhori = (temp(5))
lvert = (temp(6))
if lvert < 80 then
lvert = 0
elseif lvert > 200
lvert = 255
else
lvert = 128
endif
if rvert < 80 then
rvert = 0
elseif rvert > 200
rvert = 255
else
rvert = 128
endif
lmotor = 3000 - ((4 * boost) * (128-lvert)) ;converts 0 to 2000, 128 to 3000, 255 to 4000
rmotor = 3000 - ((4 * boost) * (128-rvert))
pulsout 0, lmotor
pulsout 1, rmotor
'---------------------------------------------------------------------
goto main
