Arduino Controlled Vex Robotics Platform

Finally got an Arduino. If you don't know what that is, it's a tiny microcontroller board based around an Atmel ATMega328 (at least on the newest models) microcontroller chip. The Vex robotics platform has its own microcontroller but it is expensive and requires an expensive programming cable (I have the controller but without the cable it is only good for R/C control). The $30 Arduino is interfaced to the laptop using a MAX232 RS-232 to TTL serial adapter (the Arduino supports USB but my old laptop only has one USB port which I'm using for the Xbox 360 controller). The LED flashes GREEN when it receives a good serial "frame" (4 bytes; 255, motor1, motor2, 200) and RED when the serial frame fails (first and last byte aren't 255 and 200). This is because simply sending two values would get mixed up between the two motors and it wouldn't work correctly. The hardest part was actually getting the PC to read the Xbox controller, the Arduino side was fairly easy to get working. I plan to eventually get a netbook and use USB and WiFi to drive it around the common area from my desktop :)

Sorry about the resolution...forgot my camera was in the lowest possible settings :(

I'll upload more videos as I make progress on the robot (just got Arduino yesterday).

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• arduino
• robot
• pc
• rs232
• xbox
• controller
• linux
• avr
• motor
• led
• usb
• interface
• servo
• robotics
• vex
• duemilanove

[FutureInventions]

OH MY GOD MAN! Great video, but how did you link up the Xbox controller and everything? I'm going to attempt the same thing, except I haven't gotten my arduino yet. (it's the mega) Please reply!

[CalcProgrammer1]

@FutureInventions You can't read the Xbox controller directly on the Arduino (it is USB) so I used my laptop to connect the two. The Arduino takes commands from the serial port and the PC (a Linux C++ program) reads the controller, converts the decimal values into a range that works with the Arduino (0 to 180, integers) and outputs it over the serial port to drive the robot. See my newer video using my netbook over WiFi, it's essentially the same thing.

[HomebrewReviews]

XDDDD you have everyting i want, except i have a wii with homebrew but my csi broke :(

[CalcProgrammer1]

I have a Wii with homebrew but I don't use it much. One thing I don't have much of is time and the tiny bit I do have I'm using to learn microcontroller programming (something we're using on college robotics team). That's why I'm building my own little testing platform...I want a netbook so I can control it using a Wiimote :)

[johndixonkingdom]

wow i didnt no u could do that with an xbox controller. wat else can u use controllers for

[CalcProgrammer1]

You can use controllers for just about anything. Over the summer I wrote an Xbox controller interface for our robotics team robot (we have a big robot for competitions) and I decided to do the same thing with a small Vex robot I had from some high school competitions. I had to replace the Vex controller with an Arduino and get a serial interface to the computer, then I could just use my Xbox controller program on it.

[AKSoapy29]

Neat ;D

[blesshiscottonsocks]

nice :D

[Smalls1652]

Pretty neat.

And welcome back CalcP.