This blog has been created to share the journey of some autonomous robot hobbyists towards Pi Wars 2024.
June 1
June 1, 2023 the return of
Pi Wars was announced: Pi Wars 2024 - Disaster Zone
June 4
So, on June 4 a call was
sent out on a mailing list to find robot enthusiasts who wanted to be part of a
team for Pi Wars 2024...
June 7
On June 7 we had a team
covering the following skills:
- mechanical
- electronics
- 3D print design
- robotics
- programming
Note that blogging is not
one of our skills 😉.
June 9
Where the initial team
communication was done using e-mail, we started using a Miro board (https://miro.com/) for online brainstorming on June
9.
June 10 to 12
From June 10 to 12, using
mail we discussed topics like our motivations for participating, which
challenges to participate in, tools to use, and of course a team name.
Why do we want to
participate?
- have lots of fun
- have a great weekend with like-minded people in the UK
- learn new skills
- Even though no one has experience with OpenCV, it is on everyone's to-do list.
- satisfaction
Initial tool selection
- Miro
board
- https://miro.com/
- for
online brainstorming
- Discord
- https://discord.com/
- for online discussions
- jitsi
- https://jitsi.org/
- for
online meetings
- Google
Drive
- https://www.google.com/drive/
- to
share files
- git
- https://git-scm.com/
- for
source code control
- GitHub
- https://github.com/
- for
storing our git repos.
- Blogger
- https://www.blogger.com/
- for
hosting our blog
Team name
Dutch Rescue
Team
June 14
June 14, we
had our first online meeting.
Lots of
things to share our initial thoughts on, like:
- Pi Wars 2024 entry
- mutual expectations
- how many robots will we build?
- motor type
- raspberry
- batteries
- wheel diameter
- lidar type
- camera type (global shutter?, 360 degree?)
- OpenCV
- nerf gun
- Git / GitHub usage
June 15 to 29
From June
15 to 29, we brainstormed and kept diverging in discord and on our Miro board.
Resulting in many ideas
and notes on our Miro board:
Ideas for storing barrels
for the Eco Challenge:
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Possible grippers for the
Eco Challenge
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Testing barrel detection
using a lidar:
|
The situation:  |
The lidar view of the barrels:  |
A quick speed / accuracy
test with an existing robot:
Speed 1600
mm/s and return accuracy < 10 mm!
Ideas on chassis layout
and overall structure:
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June 30
The Kick-off our first physical meeting on June 30.
Goals of the kick-off
meeting
After weeks of
brainstorming and divergence it was time to meet and make a first attempt at
some convergence....
The primary goal:
- Define our base robot at a high level.
Secondary goals:
- Agree on programming languages.
- Agree what documentation will be created.
- Agree on documentation formats.
- Define other work packages to start with.
Work packages
In preparation for this
meeting, we defined that we will be working with what we call ‘work packages’
as more or less independent executed development parts, with a scope and an
accountable team member.
How to define the Base
Robot
In
preparation for this meeting, we also defined the process to follow during the
meeting to get to the high level definition of our Base Robot.
- Which categories will we compete in?
- Challenges run autonomously.
- Challenges by remote control.
- Pre-competition blogging challenge.
- For each challenge define both the Minimal Viable Solution and possible Target Solution(s).
- For each possible solution:
- The required sensors.
- Required extensions.
- Consider power requirements for the extension.
- Possibly required proofs of concept / technology.
- Define wheel layout and powertrain.
- Modules making up the base robot.
- Microcontrollers and single-board computers to use.
- Additional not required sensors to enhance the base capabilities (e.g. additional ToF sensors)
- Resulting in high level design:
- Wheel layout and powertrain.
- Sensor list and position.
- Communication technologies / protocols to use between different modules and extensions.
- Power supply.
Which challenges will we
take on?
Although we’re all
passionate about autonomous robotics, we decided to also participate in the
other challenges, because of the fun. So, we decided to participate in:
- Autonomous
- Remote control
- Blogging
Initial work packages
The work
packages we assigned during our kick-off meeting:
- Base Robot
- Nerf Gun
- Blogging
- Pi Wars application
Possible extensions
- 360 camera
- speaker
- led lights
- nerf dart shooter
- gripper and storage for barrels
Possible other work
packages
- Test courses
- Prototype 360 camera
- Color recognition
- Zombie recognition
- Remote control
Work package: Base Robot
Scope
- Chassis
- Battery
- Wheels
- Motors
- Realtime Controller
- API over serial
Elements
- Two wheels on a rigid frame
- One motor per wheel
- 24V motors
- Space for a 6S battery
- Raspberry Pi 4
- Only mounting and accessibility of the ports
- Further as a black box for this work package
- Camera
- Raspberry Pi Camera 3 – Wide
- Definition front: the camera looks forward
- Per challenge one or more extensions can be attached
- E.g. beam with additional wheel(s)
- E.g. nerf gun
Work package: Nerf Gun
Scope
- Meant for The Zombie Apocalypse
- Has to be able to shoot nerf darts
- Possibly a laser to help aiming
- Controlled from the main controller (RPi), that decides based on camera images what the extension should do
- API
- Not: Code RPi
Work package: Blogging
Scope
- Write and publish blogs
Work package: Pi Wars Application
Scope
- Take care of application
- As promising as possible; see organizational assessment aspects
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