I call the project the Midnight Prowlerbot, namely because it is usually near midnight when I work on the robot. The robot base is a CH3-R hexabot with a Basic Atom Pro on an ABB with the SSC32.
A BlueSmirf is used to communicate with a CMUCam2+ which is mounted on a pan/tilt deck. The CMUCam2+ provides object tracking, sends video back to a laptop, and passes messages from the laptop to the ABB through a servo output on the CMUCam2+. I modified the original Java GUI code to provide the ability to send directional commands through a servo output on the CMUCam2+ to the ABB. I also modified the GUI to do tracking a little differently than the original code did.
The Midnight Prowlerbot also has an IR sensor on each side for side detection to prevent bumping into things. There is also a PING sensor on the front for obstacle avoidance. There is also an HM55B compass module on the pan/tilt deck to detect which direction the bot is facing and also used to command the bot to face in a specified direction. An LCD is also mounted on the bot for feedback and troubleshooting.
I created a blog at midnightbot.blogspot.com/ to track the changes as I modify the bot. As I think of something, I try it and hope it works. The blog also has a few video clips and schematics as well as pointers on what I had to do to transmit video from the CMUCam2+ through the BlueSmirf and other quirks that I’ve documented.
Here is a link to one of the videos: youtube.com/watch?v=tJmez2_sqgo
