Completion of MYR1

Has it been a year already. Today I am a happy camper. I have completed all 75 issues of IDroid-01. This means s/he is a complete robot. Looking at this robot in full hull structure I realize how much hardware/time I have spent on this project. I hope to take this hobby to the next level of a robot enthusiast. I am looking forward to all the programming I will have to do, not to mention a few mods and upgrades.

Having said that I have finished issues through 75, ironically I have to take him apart. The left arm decoder is malfunctioning and the left LED for the eye needs to be replaced. It sounds like a simple task however to reach these parts I have to pretty much take him completely apart. All in a days work though.

Again I give Kudos to the DeAGOSTINI service crew.
P.S. It is 12:53 here in Japan and I just finished watching The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957) .... Col. Nicholson played by Alec Guinness, he is the guy who played Obi-wan kenobi in Star Wars a New Hope. R.I.P Sir Alec Guinness.

CMOS Connected

Good News. I finally got the CMOS camera connected to the Bluetooth. The Bluetooth USB was a gift from DeAGOSTINI by the way. Goosh I like this company!! Now I am able to see what ID-01 sees. I hooked the BT connection through the ID-01 PC control program from the second CD and for a second I was happy, then of course the battery life went out. I did not get to check all of the commands or actions however he says "Install battery" when the batteries are low (what a smart ass) or denki kudasai in Japanese, which means the same thing. Anyway from now on there will be a lot to do as he is on issue 67 and completion of him would be issue 75. I have called DeAGOSTINI and there will be 15 extra issues for a hand unit. The fun part now will be inputting algorithms which there are many and you can make your own from the visual editor also on the CD ROM 2.

Base Test

What a great day to stay inside (it is stormy today) and to do some more algorithms with myrobot ID-01. What I have been doing instead of blogging every week is to wait a month, maybe three, because at times there is really nothing to do with ID-01. Well of course I could think about all the cool stuff he is going to do when completed but that's just dreaming and there are a lot of those on the internet already. Just look at the Youtube comments. OK so now I have her connected to the base/wheels. Here is with her first base movement test.

Phase 3 video

Phase 3 the head is connected to the torso and is able to pan 30/45/90 degrees right and left through the ability of sound. MyRobot IDroid-01 continues phase one and two testing which includes, touching the top of his head for an action of Yes. But the most exciting part is IDroid-01 is able to respond from voice commands. Yes he has no arms but he can talk lol. The commands preset as of now are.

Konnichiwa and IDroid-01 replies Konnichiwa, translation, Hello
Arigatou, tranlation, thank you, IDroid-01 replies Doutashimashite, translation, you are welcome or for you non Japanese speakers say "don't touch my mustache."
When you call out ID01 he replies nan desu ka, translation, what do you need or watashi wa koko desu, translation, that is me. Interesting thing is IDroid-01 picks which one to say on that command. If he has no ideal what you are saying he will reply wakrimasen, translation, I do not understand. He will soon be able to record up to 16 messages for 10 sec. each. The command is message and IDroid-01 replies message ichi, translation, message one this is just a pretest command as is the command action and IDroid-01 replies with OK.

QRIO video

Sony's QRIO, Price range is around 50,000 US dollars per unit. Unfortunately QRIO is not for sale. Sony has NIX the sales program and decided to use QRIO as an ambassador for future projects. I have read that Sony has spent 10 years and 50 million US dollars to construct this domestic assistant. The good news is MyRobot IDroid-01 is being built in our average home here in Japan. Enjoy the future.

Problem in Phase Two

When all issues in phase two were completed. I switched the on button and started to smell and see smoke come from the top of IDroid-01's head. "Shit" a choice word for engineers. I immediately went to the forum board on DeAGOSTINI and saw this was a problem for a lot of people. It turns out that the second circuit board from the first batch was defective. Of course I returned the circuit board and received another one promptly. Which brings me to the post. Japanese have the greatest service I have ever seen. I received a replacement chip got to keep the defective chip(now I have a piece to come up with my own algorithms) I was sent the entire neck gears, motor and housing unit for free. So basically they made sure that both parts worked in coherent with each other. The two sections fit like a glove and Idroid-01 was running smoothly. The time money and effort spent on helping me with my problem, the customer service (DeAGOSTINI had an English translator for me at no extra charge)was one more reason I think Japan gets the highest Kudos for satisfaction on dealing with customers. After this first early experience I am confident that if further problems arise (it is a robot) DeAGOSTINI will be there. They have made a customer for life.

Phase Two

Issues 7 thur 15 completes phase two. These issues were easy to put together, average time was about 3-10 minutes. Issue 15 is the circuit board for the second test. This test will allow MyRobot IDroid-01 to pan at 30/45 and 90 degree angles left and right. Pan motion is controled by snapping the fingers at the angle you wish to see its head turn.

First Issue

The first issue is the front part of the face. It was half price. In Japan this is considered to be service rather then sale price. But when you see IDroid-01, 1390yen is a price you would set aside weekly for this robot. A must have for all robot enthusiast.

There are 7 phases which complete IDroid-01, with a possible bonus phase of another 15 issues to give IDroid-01 a workable hand. The first phase consisted of six issues. It was real easy to assemble these parts. An instruction booklet with detailed pictures to show the step-by-step process comes with each issue.
After the first six issues were assembled. Phase one. IDroid-01 was able to take his first test. He was able to use his touch sensor which enabled him to shake his head yes. His eyes also were tested in a various colors of attitude. Red, green, orange and yellow. His ears LCD tested blue.

The Ultimate Test

I thought people might want to know exactly how durable, My Robot is. A girlfriend of mine was in my home and she was very frustrated about some life drama, aren't we all. Anyway she picked up my IDroid-01 and she threw IDroid-01 to the floor. "AAHHHH" I guess IDroid-01 looked like someone she knew. Well of course I quickly went into action to save my friend as he was only in issue 27.

The damage was minimal to my surprise. After seeing the head pop off, I thought he immediately turned into an ashtray. My friend apologized and asked me what she needed to do to get IDroid-01 back to his original state. So I got out my favorite tools, collected his head and body and began to take him apart to see what I needed to fix.

Parts that needed replacing issues 9, 10 and 14. So basically it was a neck fracture. The power cord from issue 14 is repairable if you know how to use a sauder gun. The black encoder disc from issue 10 cracked, all other parts from 10 were good. The parts which held the head to the body from issue 9 was snapped from the body leaving the screws in place. That's the Total Damage, there was some scratches on the top of IDroid-01 head but now I have a reason to sand and paint him.

In conclusion after parts were reordered and put back in place IDroid-01 was working just like new. I found out you don't have to be so gentle with IDoid-01. DeAGOSTINI gets kudos for a well constructed personal robot. As for the girl, I told her that robots are the future and we should behave ourselves in a little more civilized manner.

Specs For IDroid-01

WEIGHT 2 Kg
HEIGHT 30 cm/s (max)
DEGREES 7 put into effect to you, 4 do not put into effect to you
WHEELS 3 (2 GdL):
- 2 put into effect wheels independent
- 1 wheel of support not put into effect
ARMS
2 (x 3 GdL everyone):
- put into effect, shoulder
- elbow not put into effect, with cluch
HEAD (2 GdL): "pan & tilt" it puts into effect to you
OTHER Hip (1 GdL): position
MODULES 7 modules on distributed architecture:
- Head/SoundFollower (Freescale MC68HC908AP8)
- Motherboard (Freescale MC68HC908AP8)
- Voice (Sensory RSC-4128 1MB Flash Simultaneous R/W )
- Bluetooth, Class 2 (National LMX9830A)
- Brain & Vision (Freescale MC9328MXL 150MHz, 16MB Flash, 16MB SDRAM)
- Base (Freescale MC9S08GT16)
- Arms (Freescale MC68HC908AP8)
IT ARRANGES OPERATING Module B&V: Embedded Linux (2,4)
NET NEURALE SOM, exclusive right for "the emotional" evolution of the robot
VOCAL ACKNOWLEDGMENT - 50+ commands "speaker independent", to single activation from a dictionary of 40+ terms
- 1 password biometric "speaker
VOCAL SYNTHESIS 60+ precarious phrases
LOUDSPEAKERS 1 (connected to the Voice module)
MICROPHONES 4 (1 vocal acknowledgment + 3 localization of sounds)
IT ARRANGES OF VISION Survey presence and movement of face, hands and objects colors to you
IT FOLLOWS OBJECTS
IT TAKES OBJECTS (currently it cannot grab but transports objects with the accessory tray) Note: after part 75 will expand with grable hand
SENSOR VIDEO 0,3 CMOS Mega Pixel, Color (resolution max 640x480)
COMMUNICATION BT class 2 (10m-30m)
DOORS 1 RS-232
1 USB ("device", not "host")
1 I2C (available for breadboard)
PROGRAMMING Visual Editor, C-like (embedded), Java (remote control)
BATTERIES 8, 2AA (alkaline or re loadable)
AUTONOMY 4 hours (I use typical)
ULTRASOUND
SENSORS 2 emittters, 3 receivers
SENSORS TEMPERATURE 1 with accuracy 1°C
SENSORS LIGHT 2
DISPLAY Alphanumeric LCD, 16x2
LED - 3 led x 3 colors x 2 eyes (available for color and eye)
- 1 led x 2 orecchie (available singularly)
- 2 led x 2 wheels (available all entirety)
- 1 led x accessory torch (available)
- diagnostic others led
AUDIO RECORDING Max 10 second messages from 16 people
ACCESSORIES Tray, torch, load-batteries, serial