Ok, this is the 3DOF Arm I will be buying for my SPY2 Robot.
lynxmotion.com/images/jpg/asb043.jpg
Can anyone tell me what all these parts are? its hard to see them all. Also, what kind of electronics I should use for controlling it Via PS2 controller. is this the only controller I can use to controll it?
thx.
As far as I can tell its made out of:
4x multi-purpose servo brackets
2x C long
1x C short
1x L bracket
1x mini grips
5x servos
I was a bit lazy to put full names and codes. The number is the amount of units used, NOT how many sets to buy (4x multi-purpose servo brackets means buy 2 sets)
You can control it via the SSC-32 and just connect it to the ABB. Or you can use the basic atom’s servo commands. If your using DC motors for your bot then just use the ABB to control these servos.
yea, robodude has it right, and dont forget its 4 standard size servos and 1 micro
and robodude has it right again, there is tutorials to connect the SSC32 and the ABB there are also tuorials to tell you how to connect one of the PS2 cables on the main LM site to the ABB
and there is also another option on the electronics, control the arm using just an ABB, it will eliminate any need for more complicated codes of the SSC32 and ABB cominication, and its really easy to set up the code, for the most part, and thats just about it,
other please correct me if im wrong with anything
Why would you need one servo micro? I have the same gripper and I use a standard size servo… 
I think its ok with standard
Sam
Haza! I am right again =D If you aren’t sure what servos to get, you can get the gripper with servos included for $41. Or you can just buy a 6 pack of servos and get free metal horns (suggested if your gunna be lifting heavy things i think.)
Sam, do you know how much torque the gripper needs to lift heavy stuffs? I think it will work with a 15$ servo but won’t close as fast or hold as well as if it was with a 5645 or something else. shrugs
ok, nvm then, sry bout the mis information, i thought only the micro servos fit in it 
You asked if there’s other controller options.
There’s a whole host of options available for controllers.
You can use a laptop/PC with a high-throughput wireless module, like the WiPort (802.11b), as has already been done.
Or you can go even more expensive/fast with an 802.11g module.
Or you can go cheaper and slower with Bluetooth.
Then there’s RC controllers and recievers.
I’m betting that the arial models would be best, since RC car recievers are sometimes quite bulky.
There’s even a neat 2.4Ghz radio out there.
Most people stay away from radios, unless they already have them, since there’s not a lot of buttons.
You can probably get away with using just about any game console’s controllers.
Most controllers are just micros that read when a button is pushed and send out a corresponding character(s), serially.
At one point, I was even debating using a leftover N64 controller I had laying about, but dropped that idea, since there wasn’t enough buttons for my fancy.
You don’t even need to limit yourself to wireless controllers, since you can always whack a wireless transmitter on the controller and a reciever on the SSC-32/micro.
If you’ve a mind to use a different controller, you’ll first need to figure out what it sends for each button press.
Regular buttons will probably be a single character or even a single bit of a character, wheras an analog joystick will be one or more full characters.
Which ever is the case, part of each sending for every button will contain information that tells the micro which button it is and whether it’s pressed or depressed (which may be simplified as just sending an indication of which button has been pressed).
In the case of an analog joystick, there will be an additional portion of the sending dedicated to representing the direction and degree of depression.
To figure all of this out, you’ll need a terminal program (I suggest downloading one that displays in hexadecimal) and something to connect your controller to a computer’s COM port.
You could use a wireless module there, or simply a DB9 cable and a MAX232 chip.
Perhaps you could directly hook the controller up to a parallel port (since I hear that they’ve got regular logic-level inputs?).
But, I don’t have a parallel port on my laptop, so I haven’t been able to play with one, and so I might be lying.
Come to think of it, you could even use a serial-enabled LCD, but you might be limited by what characters that LCD can display.
Then, you simply press a button, write down what you recieve and reverse engineer from there.
It’s a really neat project to play around with.
Dan Albert reverse-engineered a wireful (that’s officially a word now, guys) PS2 controller and then used a Zigbee wireless module to connect it to his Robonova.
I plan on following suit in the future, but I might just use a Gamecube controller just to spite him.
Sorry, but it’s actually 3x Long “C” brackets. There are no short ones in the arm.
[code]Parts List:
2x ASB-10/B (Long “C”)
2x ASB-04/B (Multi-Purpose)
1x ASB-03/B (“L” Connector)
1x LG-NS (Gripper w/out servos)
5x Servos (Standard size)[/code]
Oh, whoops. Sorry. It looked like a short from that angle.
Well, I have 422 servos and the gripper doesn’t close very fast, but in my ‘‘tests’’ it looks like its the rest of the arm with 422’s that cant lift the weight.
Sam
I’m not sure what would cause one servo to be “faster” or “slower”. Look at the specs. The torque can vary a great amount, but the speed is usually very close. The manufacturer of the little gripper requires the servo horn screw be loosened a 1/4 turn to prevent binding, which could slow things up a bit. You sure that’s not what’s going on?
I would like to run it with another laser 4 controller, but not sure how I would connect a reciever to it. I would prefere this becuase it has max distance and can go through walls.
No, I did read that and unscrewed it. well, its like the first time I have servo, so I geuss that that’s the normal speed.
Sam
