Test Lego motor

Test the motor to make sure each pin's function, as well as the connection of the wire.

Just connect pin 1 and 2 to a power supply(9V) and connect pin 3 to gnd, pin 4 to 4.3 V, pin 5&6 to oscilloscope. then the motor ran and the encoder feed back 2 signal, which was shown on oscilloscope. From the 2 signal we can calculate the speed of the motor 

The detail method wound not be introduced here, but it is a good question for students .

Hack the lego NXT motor

There are 6 pin on the motor.
Pin Number          color             name
    1               white             M1
    2               black             M2
    3                Red              GND
    4               Green           4.3 power
    5               Yellow           Tach 00
    6               Blue             Tach 01


Pin 1&2  provide power to the motor
pin 3: GND
pin 5&6: used for the optical encoder build in the NXT motors.

Hack the Lego NXT- (transformation port )

Port Transformation:
 the port of lego(NXT) hardware is like RJ12 (normal telephone port), they all are 6 pins inside. but not  exactly same.

RJ12:

 

 NXT Port :

 The NXT port  and adoptor are not easy to find, so I decide to make a NXT port to 6 pins wire myself. Then I can connect the NXT moter to SK10 board.

The wire is remaked from a NXT port to NXT port Cable. Just remove one PLUG. As each wire in this cable is very thin and soft, it is not good to work on the SK10 board. So I solder them  to the wires which are suitable to work on SK10 board.  Insulating tape was used to make sure all pins are not short-circuit with each other as well as fix them.

The cable are tested by the NXT motor, it works well!

 

Althought it is a very small and easy work in the whole projcet, It is a good start!! 

Lego Mindstorm+IPAD

Lego mindstorm NXT2.0 would be a good choice in this project. It is relatively cheap.

the motors and sensors in lego kit are all useful hardware in this project.

Headphone Jack connection

Here is two example of using 3.5mm Jack as I/O connection.

1.Sensor Data to iPhone Through the Headphone Jack (Using Arduino)

2. iOS IR Remote with Arduino

Interface sulotion

A possible method of connection

http://www.redpark.com/c2db9.html

A good way to build the mechanical part

A good way to build the mechanical part
http://www.gearseds.com/solar_tracker.html

It is really good kit to build everything you want.
BUT it very very very expensive!!( about 1000 euro)

IMPOSSIBLE

Final Year Project Specification

Project Specification

A. Project Description and Methodology:

The aims of the project is to develop a feedback control experiment with Ipad for year two student as well as authoring a lab script. The main idea is to make Ipad work as a controller in the feedback control system. It will connect with some hardware like motor  and sensor, developing to a feedback control system.  My ideas for this experiment is to design a sunlight tracking system for the solar cells. In this system, some motors work as actuator and some light sensors send feedback to controller (Ipad). This system can adjust its angle of solar cell to get the most sunlight

B. Project Tasks and Milestones:

Tasks

·         Learning the Objective C language.

·         Design or buy a completed model of sun tracker.

·         Building sensors, motor and power supply on the model.(Plant)

·         Connecting Ipad to hardware: apple dock to USB, then to the circuit of motor and sensors

·         Develop the application for this system

·         Test the whole system

·         Use a solar cell as a power supply (optional)

Milestones

·         Finish the hardware part assembling                            1-11-2012

·         Control the motors by ipad manually and get value from sensors     20-11-2012

·         Application interface                                       20-12-2012

·         Finish the application to control the system automatically           1-2-2013

C. Project Deliverables:

·         Application on Ipad to realize the feedback control

·         The hardware part of  this feedback control system: Solar tracker

·         Laboratory script

·         Some Test for students and upload the result to Vital

D. Project Rationale and Industrial Relevance.

·         Develop a experiment for year two students with Ipad, which is easy to mark and

Upload results

·         The sunlight tracking system may be used in solar cells or solar water heater

·         This is a new attempt of using ipad work as a processor in our experiments and

projects, which may bring us some new inspiration