Do not miss the new up-to-date and detailed How to Build a Robot – Grand Tutorial Series.
The following article will show you how to build a simple robot, called “The Beetle Robot”, created by
Jerome Demers.
It’s great for beginners and is easy to do. Before starting, I suggest
you to read the complete tutorial below. This will greatly lower the
chances of you making a mistake. This is the Beetle Robot v. 3 you are
going to build:
Tools Needed:
Components for the robot
Here are the serial numbers of the components and tools from
RadioShack .
soldering iron |
64-2184 |
electronic solder |
64-006 |
diagonal cutter |
64-2951 |
1.5 Volts motor |
273-223 |
battery holder |
270-398 |
SPDT switch |
275-016 |
Most of the components can be bought for much cheaper at
Digi-Key,
Jameco, or similar. At
RobotShop, you can find the
dual AA battery holder and the
small DC motor.
You can also find these components at any good electronic component
store. Here are all the parts needed for the construction the beetle
robot:
1. Cut the electric wire in pieces of 6 cm each, 13 times.
Strip 1 cm at each end.
2. Regroup all the components.
3. Solder each wire to each components except the two batteries.
4. Take the battery holder and make a connection to the connection.
This will give a third connection.See picture below.
The blue wire is the third connections
5. Turn the battery holder up side down so the
batteries point to the ground. Glue the two switches on the battery
holder in a V form.
6. Glue the motor beside each switch so that the shaft touches the ground
7. Take the big paperclip and make the caster like the picture below.
You can make a nice looking caster or a normal one
I prefer the nice one
8. How to make the connection
9. Take the small paper clip and bend them to make antenna.
Glue them to the switches and don’t put to much glue.
Add 1 cm of heat shrink to the shaft of each motor.
10. Add the batteries in the battery holder and put it on a flat surface
to see your creation take life. Congratulations!
There is a comprehensive debugging tutorial on Jerome’s site, in French. A Google translation is here.
For further information on learning how to make a robot, please visit the
RobotShop Learning Center. Visit the
RobotShop Community Forum in order to seek assistance in building robots, showcase your projects or simply hang-out with other fellow roboticists.