| We have more goodies in and cannot wait to share! We’re serious, it’s like Christmas morning each day we get new stuff in, just ask our extremely annoyed shipping/receiving department about it. New product shows up and our techs swarm in like vultures! |
| First up we have the Propeller Education Kit which is an absolute steal at $99.99. Included is everything you need to get started using Parallax’s very capable Propeller microcontroller technology. Why use a normal microcontroller when you can get 8 of them in a single chip? Included in the kit is a Propstick USB, a Propeller Fundamentals Lab/Project book, various components needed for said projects, and some neat interconnecting breadboards for rapid prototyping. |
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| We’re also proud to introduce our new Mosquit-IO Pan/Tilt kit! The Mosquit-IO is a board we had custom designed specifically to answer the call of a low cost pan/tilt controller, bringing the price down $20 from our previous Pan/Tilt Kit. The Mosquit-IO can control two servos and a 6v DC motor, and is also available separately. A USB interface, simple command syntax, and provided .NET example code make this very easy to get up and running. |
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| Drooling over the insane torque and features of the DX-117, RX-28, RX-64 Robot servos from Robotis? We are too, and we’re making it even easier to implement them into your next project by offering a High Quality Aluminum bracket system for these. Hinge brackets, side brackets, bearing hubs, and thrust bearings! Everything you need to get started in building the ultimate high torque robot! |
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Archive for the ‘New Kits / Products’ Category
New parts are in the house!
Wednesday, April 8th, 2009Announcing the Dancebot USB!
Wednesday, April 1st, 2009| You’ve all seen and heard the robotic dancing sensation known as Keepon, and now you can own one! |
| When Keepon first debuted, bouncing along to Spoon’s “I Turn My Camera On”, the tech community went nuts! The simple, cute external appearance of this robot and it’s natural ability to bop along with music was an instant hit on Youtube. Unfortunately, beneath that elastic yellow skin was well over $20,000 worth of cutting edge robotic technology, putting this awesome robot out of reach of its fans. We saw this as a problem and answered the call to unite Keepon and it’s millions of fans globally! |
| After many months of painstaking R&D, Trossen Robotics is proud to announce the Low Cost Dancebot! Once only available to universities as a high end social development research robot, we are now offering the affordable yet equally groovy Low Cost Dancebot! This easy to build kit only takes minutes to put together, another minute to put on the Spoon song of your choice, and within seconds your Low Cost Dancebot! will be dancing along to the beat. Be the envy of your coworkers with this ultimate desktop gadget! Show off to your friends, amaze your family, and impress your employer! |
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Introducing the Roboard: The Robot Computer
Friday, March 20th, 2009The Roboard RB-100 is a new breed of robotics controller: a fusion of a traditional microcontroller and a full function computer. Think of it as an OS capable microcontroller on steroids, boasting a 32bit x86 CPU running at 1000MHz and 256MB DRAM. The ability to load an operating system of your choice and have direct access to I/O, Comm ports, USB, and networking opens this controller up to a wide range of robotics based applications. Our Roboard Starter Kit comes with just about everything you need to implement this feature rich controller in your next robotics project! All you need to supply is a 1-2gb Micro-SD card to load an OS onto, 6-24v, and a robot!
RX-64s are crazy strong…
Monday, February 23rd, 2009Our good friend Jon Hylands (who is an amazing Roboticist, definitely check out his work on the Bioloid system) is working on a few new projects and shot a quick video which is pretty impressive to anyone who has ever built a robotics arm. What you see in the video below is an RX-64 Robotis servo lifting a full coke can at a 30 cm arm length. While that seems trivial to we humans, packing that much torque into such a tiny servo is a great demonstration of how much servo technology has advanced in the last few years. The servo isn’t even being strained during these tests. You might note a bit of jerky movement, that is because the servo is being manually fed positional instructions via a slider bar. Most advanced robots use some form of interpolation which smooths movements considerably.
We’ll also be revealing our big internal project which uses 14 of the RX-64 servos in the near future… =)
New Robot Parts Roundup!
Wednesday, February 11th, 2009| We’ve been working feverishly away to add even more robot parts and upgrades for your greater building pleasure. Here are some highlights of the cool new products that have just been added to the Trossen Robotics catalog! |
PICBEE- Finally an easy method to use the Maxstream XBEE module coupled with the power of the Microchip PIC 18F series micro-controller. As a stand alone board, it can be a development platform or target device for nearly any application. This is perfect for creating a wireless sensory aquisistion network! |
Maxbotix WR-1 – Sonar Low-Voltage Weather-Resistant Ultrasonic Range Finder (IP67 Rated) With 3V – 5.5V power the LV-MaxSonar®-WR1™ provides very short to long-range detection and ranging, in a compact, robust PVC housing, designed to meet IP67 water intrusion, and matches standard electrical ¾” PCV pipe fittings. |
The Roboduino is a Freeduino (Arduino software compatible) microcontroller board designed for robotics. All of its connections have neighboring power buses into which servos and sensors can easily be plugged. Additional headers for power and serial communication are also provided. The kits come fully assembled and with a USB cable for programming and debugging. |
The IOWizard is used when additional I/O capabilities are required. The IOWizard features an I2C interface that allows users to query 5 analog inputs and 10 digital I/O lines. The default I2C slave address is 100d (0×64h), and it can be changed to a value between 100d and 110d (0×6Eh). |
Looking to make your Robobuilder Humanoid more durable? This Metal Bracket Upgrade Kit is the way to go! These high-quality aluminum brackets reinforce the legs and servo joints to fortify your robot to take a beating during competitions or rough play. |
The Robobuilder 3-Axis Accelerometer sensor module measures the acceleration in all three axis (X, Y and Z). Read measurements range from -7 to +7. Integral number 1 can be translated into 1/4g (here g stands for gravity acceleration). By analyzing the return value on each axis you can determine the actual position/orientation of the robot at any time. |
MAKE: Getting started with the 3pi
Wednesday, February 4th, 2009Make came up with a very easy to read “Getting Started” guide for the Pololu 3pi, which we carry as a complete starter kit. If you’re looking for an inexpensive platform to start programming in C with, you won’t find a better value than the 3pi Robot.
This week I am going to show you how to get up and running with the 3pi by Pololu. I will be going through all the steps needed to upload the line following program that is included from Pololu. Getting started with the 3pi isn’t too difficult, but there are a few applications and drivers that need to be installed.
Note: In this tutorial I will be using a PC running Vista. You can program the 3pi on a Mac running OSX or Linux, but it’s a different procedure. You can even program the 3pi through the Arduino IDE!
Calling all Tinkerers and Packrats! Random Grab Bags!
Tuesday, February 3rd, 2009Editor’s note: Sorry folks, all sold out! Stay tuned for our next Grab Bag and/or limited time special!
We’re offering a limited time only Grab Bag of random parts, which is sure to make the geek and packrat in all of us cry out in glee.
We estimate the retail value on the parts included in this Grab Bag at over $100!
We’ve been cleaning house around here, moving out older products bringing in new… and during this spring cleaning we realized we were ending up with a large supply of very cool little gizmos and random parts. Rather than try and sell it piece by piece, we figured it would be fun to divide it all up evenly (based on value) into 30 Random Grab Bags!
Now these Grab Bags are a dream come true for tinkerers and experimenters alike. Since these parts were just going to gather dust, we figured we would mark them down to an insanely low price to get rid of them ASAP. We’re going to keep the contents a mystery as that’s half the fun of a Random Grab Gag… but I will say that all of them have at least $20 worth of aluminum parts alone.
The last time we did something like this these Grab Bags flew off the shelves, so get them while they last. You don’t find deals like this very often! We only have 30 Grab Bags available and that is it.
Click for a larger view:
Building for FIRST or Science Olympiad?
Wednesday, January 28th, 2009We’ve recently started seeing the flurry of activity that marks when teams building for the upcoming national robotics competitions start shopping. Since we stock a very large selection of robot parts, finding what you need can be a bit daunting at first. To assist builders, we’ve launched our FIRST Starter Page to help get people pointed in the right direction. Within it we’ve listed the most popular items we see flying off the shelves every competition season, laid out in an easy to navigate manner. If you or someone you know is looking for parts for their competition entry, point ‘em this way!
Phidgets, Arduinos, and Axons, Oh My!
Wednesday, January 21st, 2009We love the smell of fresh circuit boards in the morning! We’re always adding new gizmos and robotic goodies, but here’s a few items we’ve added recently that might be of interest to you tinkerers out there!
From Phidgets we have the return of the 8/8/8 Interface Kit w/ USB Hub. This is a heavy duty 6 port USB Hub, supplying 500ma per port to allow daisychaining of multiple Phidgets devices.
We’d also like to introduce the new Bipolar 1 Motor Stepper controller. Stepper motor controllers can be difficult to find at times, Phidgets makes it easy with this USB board and their reknowned API and software support behind it!
Our buddies over at Sparkfun, the next-gen Radio Shack of our times, continue to amaze us with the amount of neat electronic gadgets they pump out at insane speeds. Joining our Arduino and Atmel line up are the Arduino Pro and Arduino Pro Mini. Both are a minimalist approach to the popular Arduino microcontrollers, allowing you to add headers and wires as you see fit.
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And last but certainly not least, the Axon Microcontroller is back in stock! This board initially sold quicker than Society of Robots could make them, but we’re glad to say we’ve finally got them back in stock. These Atmel 640 based power-horse microcontrollers are a roboticist’s dream, boasting 55 I/O ports, a built in USB compiler, and a impressive software library. Pick yours up today!
Let’s give the Robonova a hand! Err, Stand!
Monday, January 19th, 2009Humanoid robots are everywhere these days, and we encounter plenty of builders on our forums that come up with all sorts of ways to suspend their bots while creating new walking motions, dances, and kung fu moves. Hitec has decided to give their builders a hand by creating this inexpensive and awesomely designed Humanoid Robot Stand.
A humanoid robot stand for $25 bucks? We had to check it out for ourselves so we tore one open and got to building, and five minutes later our Robonova was kicking freely. We also found that the Bioloid humanoid fits pretty well, which effectively kills two birds with one stone!
