Robot Builder's Bonanza, 4th Edition

My experience working through the book (sort of).A lot of good stuff for someone like me, who is new to robots, but not so new to programming. Here's my experience as far as I got, chapter by chapter.1. I tried but failed with ubuntu. The install went fine but the system just froze all the time. So I just stuck with the debian install that was there, doing the appropriate upgrades. For the most part, I don't think it's worth it to switch. I did create a partitioned SD card, and mounted it on /home (after a mv /home /home1). This was probably unnecessary, since my BBB came with 4GB, which is certainly enough for the stuff in this book.2. I just stuck to the Python part, which worked fine.3. I never managed to get a microphone that worked properly (I tried 3 different ones and 2 difference usb-to-audio adapters). I'm planning to solve this with bluetooth. In the meanwhile, the speaker stuff worked fine with one of those cheap keychain models.4. worked as per book, with a Logitech HD 720p.5. I did get the Magician Chassis, just for the wheels and motors. It seemed too small to get all the stuff on there, so I went for a couple of 8x10 Lexan sheets. The hard part was making angle brackets with the right hole spacing to accommodate the holes in the motor gearboxes. I used 1.5x1.5 aluminum angle bars cut pretty small. I got the Pololu simple motor controllers. Their software didn't install, in fact some of the dependencies didn't install, but I was able to get the Python program working. The instability he refers to in the book was really due to bugs in the code. I'll post my version later.That's as far as I went in the book. I'm planning add an arm and do some more advanced image processing, so most of the rest of the book is not for me.I do appreciate that he wrote this - it helped me ramp up very quickly. After two weeks (including waiting time for parts!) I have something is untethered and will walk around the room based on my commands as typed from a Mac ssh session into that rcrobot.py, slightly modified.

This book has lots of basics in it. If you are new to robotics, this will really help you out. It also gives some good resources on where to find things. The internet is good for that but sometimes, it takes too long to search for things so I appreciate the resources listed. If you already know the basics, this isn't going to help much. The examples are pretty specific too so they can only be used in a certain number of applications. If you're unsure if this is advanced enough, rent it at the library first. If it's for a kid who has never played with robots, I thin this would be great. For an adult, it can be a little boring, like me, I was thinking, "how long till we get to the good stuff?" Well, it's a while. It's worth keeping but I probably would have bought another book that was more advanced if I had seen more of what it had first.

This book is amazing! It's like taking a set of mechanical, electrical, and software "practitioner-level" courses focused on robotics at your local community college, but only costs you what's equivalent to a modest dinner for one person. Gordon McComb's writing style is incredibly easy to read, and is jammed packed with loads of practical knowledge of the above topics. Even if you never intend on building a robot, but want to learn about "things" and "being handy" you will finish this book with dozens of practical technical skills that you never had before. This book is unquestionably one of my best non-fiction book purchases, and gets a prime spot on my bookshelf because I will refer back to it often.

I bought this for my 8 year old son who started watching a bot fighting show. He started getting really into of making bots so I got him this to start him out. So far he has read it cover to cover and dog eared pages so he knows what to get when we go to the store. Overall I would say that it is very informational and easy enough for a smart 8 year old to read and use.

This is a great book! For anyone interested in robotics as a hobby or who just wants to learn more about it, this is the book to get.It has a lot of great projects and it explains all the basics from the different types of hardware, batteries, and configurations to electronics to programming to where to get parts. It really is a reference book though so do keep that in mind! It's very readable and understandable though and I think is a useful resource for anyone from a hobbyist to an experienced robot builder.

A lot of the robot projects from the 3rd edition were removed. Apparently they were replaced with more programming oriented projects. This was a disappointment for me because I wanted the instructions for building a "heavy duty 6 legged walker" which I had remembered from the 3rd edition. Imagine my surprise when I crack this book open and its not there. :(I see no good reason why the book could not have just gotten thicker. Retain the old projects, and add in the new stuff.To be fair though, there are some newer updated looking robotics projects that seem neat. Also this book will be a BLAST for anyone who wants to get into robot programming. A lot of the component and material descriptions are still present which is also nice.Simply put, if you get a good deal on the 3rd edition, I'd say skip this one and save some money.

I always wanted to build stuff like this as a kid, but didn't know how to get started. 20+ years later, there's tons of information out there on the web, but it's very difficult to collect the wide variety of information that's needed to build robots. I got this book from the library, and, after about two months, when they wouldn't let me renew it anymore, I decided to buy it. Good decision. It's more focused on building stuff than on programming stuff, but I'm a good programmer and lousy builder, so it's a good choice for me.

A little bit dated, but has some very good tips on electronics in general and focuses on Picaxe and Arduino in particular. Raspberry Pi fans (like me) will need to "convert" some circuits to make them work, but not difficult at all. Bargain for the price I paid - £2.19 (second hand - but in very good condition).Oh, and arrived well ahead of scheduled time, excellent 👍

It is difficult to make judgment because there is some much information out there, but we all need to start somewhere. Robotics is a huge subject and having fun is so important. I am glad that I bought this book because it gave me some useful ideas.

I would recommend Picaxe microcontrollers for the evil genius (which I would give five stars) before I could recommend this book to anyone looking to find out how to use the picaxe chips or microcontrollers. This book really doesn't get going until part 7 when my finally talks and involves the reader in picaxe, basic stamp or Arduino microcontrollers. because the first half is how to find things' for a project how to solder e.t.c. the later chapters are full of examples and circuit examples to connect the microcontrollers to various devices. The explanations of are very good.

The 4th Edition of this robot builders book is superlative. In addition to constructional aspects of building a robot, it introduces the reader to programming micro-controllers such as the Arduino, PIC and Basic Stamp micro-controllers. In the case of Arduino boards, it does so in a way that I found more comprehensible than a leading book on Arduino programming.

Massive book stuffed with ideas, projects, and background info :-)