The T-Hex is Zenta’s newest creation, inspired by all the Mech Warfare talk buzzing around the forums. He decided to jump in and build a ‘mech like’ hexapod, complete with a whopping 4DOF per leg. And of course, in the process, made the rest of us look like complete amateurs. Aesthetics aside this thing is amazing, and the fact that he has a working IK solution for it already just adds to the fact.

Also, for those looking for an inexpensive bipedal Mech Warfare platform, the BRAT based Mech project over at Lynxmotion is turning out to be quite promising, with complete build instructions and code available.

Here is forum member Sthmck’s quadrapod robot progress so far, which showcases a robot built using the Bioloid system and autonomously reacting to input from some Sharp IR sensors.

lnxfergy’s new lizard-inspired quadrapod, Sally:

And finally, lnxfergy’s fully autonomous Firefighting robot, Issy:

Some great progress so far and we can’t wait to see more!

On a side note: We’ve been a bit quiet lately because we’re in the process of moving to a much larger facility where we can build bigger, better robots! We’ll get caught up soon.

Giger is a 24″ custom 24 DOF Humanoid using 16 RX-64 and 8 RX-28 Dynamixel Servos, weighing in at 9lbs total. He uses the same Gumstix based onboard controller that Hagetaka did, designed by Farrell Robotics, and is powered by two 1900mAh 4S LiPo batteries.

Walking gait is being refined, I’ll have video in the near future but much progress has been made. If all goes well, I’ll have him up and running for iHobby 2009 next month! Here are a couple of pictures, for the full set that we took check out my gallery in the TRC!

This round is going to be a Tutorial Contest , and is quite a bit different from our previous contests. Think of it as an ‘Instructables meets How Stuff Works’ style contest: We want you to submit entries in the form of a detailed step by step ‘How-To’ or Informative Tutorials.

3rd Place goes to Jes1510!

Jes1510 submitted some ‘back to the basics’ tutorials which were well documented, easy to read through, and really helpful for the beginning robot hobbyist! He’ll be walking away with an Ollo Bug Kit!

Tutorials:

• Cheap Battery Monitor Using Resistive Voltage Divider
• Prototyping a PCB with Desoldering Braid
• Get position feedback from a standard hobby servo
• Project documentation for the hobbyist

2nd Place goes to Pi Robot!

Pi Robot amazed us with two extremely detailed, professional tutorials that cover some very advanced robotics applications by breaking it down into more digestible bite sized pieces. Both are excellent pieces of literature, definitely worth a read through! Pi Robot will be walking away with a Bioloid Beginner Kit for his contributions!

Tutorials:

• Obstacle Avoidance in the Real World
• Where Am I? Place Recognition Using Omni-directional Images and Color Histograms

1st Place goes to lnxfergy!

lnxfergy was determined to win 1st prize! He submitted awesome tutorial after awesome tutorial covering some pretty major aspects of robotics. All of these tutorials are very helpful for beginners and even more advanced builders can take something from them. From practical navigation systems to controlling AX-12 servos, lnxfergy demonstrated an amazing grasp of current hobby robotics technology, and was kind enough to share that knowledge with us. For his massive effort, he will be awarded with a Bioloid Comprehensive Kit!

Tutorials:

• So You Want To Build A Robot?
• An Introduction to Interrupts
• Choosing Sensors for Your Robot
• Materials for your Robot
• Introduction to Encoders
• Power Supply Basics
• XBEE Basics
• AVR Basics
• An Introduction to Mapping and Localization
• Controlling AX-12 Servos
• Following a Wall