Hello everyone! I would like to introduce you to Jim.
Jim isn’t a person, Jim is a robot. Not just a robot, but a robot that will be mowing my yard after a few iterations. I guess it really isn’t a robot but a drone….but not really a drone either because I will be controlling it directly in the beginning.
Ok so Jim is a remote controlled lawn mower.
Actually this version of Jim isn’t even that. It is an off the shelf tank kit from aliexpress with an arduino and other development boards cobbled together.
None of what is in this picture will likely make it to the “final” iteration, but instead is meant as a launching point. I am using this iteration to learn the electrical design, how voltage and amperage works, and maybe start getting some designs for a PCB in mind. I am very aware that I am going to make mistakes.
Ohh, Did I mention that I have no real experience in electrical engineering and mechanical engineering? I have the software part down, I have the whole architecture in mind already. Jim will be connected to my home wifi with server on board that will open a websocket with a client. The client will then send commands at a predefined interval (lets go with 120hz for now) in the form of L 0 R 0 M 0 Where L 0 Means left motor 0 throttle, R 0 means right motor 0 throttle and M 0 means mower motor 0 throttle. If the client doesn’t send anything for half a second, Jim assumes a connection issue and shut down. I am still thinking through the camera portion for a live view but that is also a problem that has been solved before.
Now, back to the shocking part. I only recently got a motor able to run, I am waiting for parts to get PWM working so I can control the motors speed with an arduino or pico. I have exactly 0 experience in designing circuits and circuit boards. That goes for mechanical engineering as well, I don’t know how many teeth I need in my drive gear to get the track rotating smoothly, I don’t really know how the suspension works and I still need to figure out how to fabricate things like motor mounts.
I can’t wait to learn it as I go!
I am using this project to make something useful to me (I am not a fan of mowing) and to learn new skills that may be useful in the future. I already know it is going to be more expensive than buying an off the shelf unit with more features like automatic mowing, but perhaps I can teach others what I learn along the way. That will make it worth it to me.