Here are a couple images of the BotBoarduino Mega Shield that we are working on. 8) It’s mated to a Seeduino Mega Board.
Stacks up pretty good!
Can it be used with the UNO as well?
Alan KM6VV
You wouldn’t gain anything by adding this shield to an UNO. The idea is to get more I/Os, not less. 
If not mistaken, I think this shield will give us access to all the UARTs, easy access to I2C, plus more GPIOs and multifunction pins.
I think this shield is specific to the Seeeduino Mega. I do only see 7 sets of pins (28 pins total) with 3 pin headers though. I am hoping for more of the Seeeduino Megas I/Os brought to 3 pin headers. Maybe I just need to wait for the Botboarduino Mega board, which I hope will have ALL the Mega’s I/O on 3 pin headers. That board won’t be able to have the usual footprint to do so though. When dealing with Megas, I don’t think the usual Lynxmotion form factor is realistic.
8-Dale
If it simply breaks out the A/D and I/O pins to 3-pin headers, it would be useful.
Alan KM6VV
It would probably work, but as you said the other benefit would be the 3 pin headers and power distribution. In theory Lynxmotion could build some sparsely populated version of these boards. But I think you would be better off with Botboarduino Jr…
Kurt
Right.
From the pictures so far, I’m not sure the Mega Shield is going to be all that great. That’s just my feelings about it at present. I was hoping to see more I/Os with 3 pin headers, but to accomplish that, there just isn’t any way to stay within the 2.3" x 3" form factor. The same will hold true for the Botboarduino Mega. One reasonable form factor that would work, and still come pretty close to the desired form factor would be a square board with 3 pin headers on all four sides - also note this would allow for right angled headers so full sized shields could be stacked. The AXON uses a square form factor, but I don’t think even it allows for ALL the I/Os to be broken out to 3 pin headers so a slightly larger board may be needed.
From the current pictures of the shield, only a slight bit more board space would be required on each side to add more 3 pin header I/Os, and the current 7 sets of pins and shield headers could remain as is.
8-Dale
Hi Dale,
Yep, it would be great to have more IO pins with 3 pin headers, but personally I think this one should be pretty good. If you compare it to what most of the Lynxmotion projects use, which is a BB2 with a Bap28, that setup has 20 total IO pins (some used up by sound and in many projects PS2…). This shield gives the user easy access to:
20 digital pins with 3 pin headers that you can choose voltage for on 4 pin chunks
8 Analog pins with 3 pin headers again you can choose voltages on 4 pin chunks (pins can also be used for digital)
(so 28 pins with 3 pin connectors) +
4 digital pins setup for PS2, with either PS2 cable or simply 2 servo extension cables
4 UARTS all setup such that you can use a simple servo extension wire to SSC-32 (GND, TX, RX)
8 other analog pins are also replicated on male pins
I2C setup with PU resistors
Sound - which does not use up any of the 3 pin connectors
3 buttons - does not eat up any of the 3 pin connectors
3 LEDS …
Yes more could be added with a larger form factor, but then it might not fit some of the robots like T-HEX…
As for Botboarduino JR, I believe there are 3 pin headers for every IO pin of the processor, so not sure what else could be done here. Yes could go to different processor, but then it would not be completely compatible with the Arduino standard.
Kurt
Greetings kurte,
This is great, for sure. 
Here is one fault I find with this shield - no 3 pin headers on these analog pins.
I think it’s great that none of these conflict and can be used together. That, indeed, is a big benefit of this shield.
Has any test fitting been done with various robots, including T-Hex, to see what the fit would be like and what room there might be for a possibly larger board? How many total I/Os from the Seeeduino Mega are current used for the present I/O configuration? I count 25 pins plus the 28 with 3 pin headers for a total of 53 (approximately). Is this correct? If so, that would leave about 20 more pins that could get 3 pin headers - if my pin calculation is correct.
I still would have championed the Atmega644P here, but also realize with that chip the board would not fit in the usual Lynxmotion form factor. Having that second UART would have been very nice, plus the few added GPIOs, and no conflict between analog and I2C functions. I might even have championed using the QFN or other package just to keep the board small.
So, I was hasty in my original view of this shield and lacked full understanding of its setup when I formed my first opinion. I now see the shield has many more possibilities with the Seeeduino Mega, which I am going to get at least one of next month. Now that I finally have a computer that is completely MINE again (Nice little 14" screen HP Pavilion with Intel core i5-460, 4 GB RAM, Intel HD video, and 640 GB HD), I can forge ahead at least on software development.
8-Dale