First off, I as a parent I know programming but no background with robots. I have 2 sons, one of whom was on his school’s robotics team but being a first year guy, he mostly worked in the machine shop for their big project and didn’t do anything for their vex and sea perch competitions because of conflicts with sports.
anyway my sons are juniors in high school and I wanted to get a starter kit for them to see how much interest they have in it as we start to look at colleges and majors, etc. After some basic reseach I think I have narrowed it down to the following:
Anyway, is there any additional items that I would need to purchase to get these going. As an example for the vex, after more research, it looks like I need to purchase it with a programming hardware kit, a software kit / license and a control kit. Is this correct? Is there anything else needed?
Is there anything similar for the other 2?
Can you compare these 3 items or are they like apples, oranges and bananas? Any insight and suggestions would be appreciated.
This comes as a kit and is intended as a base platform for learning Arduino. You can add additional sensors, shields and parts as you would to any other custom project. It comes with everything you need to control it wired from a computer (unless you purchase the XBee or Bluetooth versions) and we suggest adding a distance sensor and whatever other sensors they may wish to experiment with. It can be used as a stand-alone Arduino as well.
The Calwbot is the “demo robot” of the VEX system. In addition to the basic clawbot, you would need a microcontroller, programming cable, software, battery, charger and charger cable. This will allow you to control it autonomously, but in order to do anything significant, you will also need sensors.
Go with Vex if you want something more advanced than LEGO and are prepared to invest in the long-term. The initial investment is rather high and instead of the ClawBot we would suggest one of the started kits. The DFRobotShop Rover series allow you to create almost every type of wheeled vehicle, but you cannot use it to, say, create a robotic arm. The Finch is a basic platform for programming.
You would need a Bluetooth module such as RB-Dfr-95, RB-Dfr-10, RB-See-223 etc. the choice is yours. You would also need 2x RB-Spa-631 XBee sockets. The price differences between the XBee modules accounts for the price difference in the BT kit. The kit also includes a USB cable which the basic version does not. The kit essentially combines all the necessary components in order to get started with Bluetooth.
