Alt-BEAM Archive
Message #00360
To: beam beam@corp.sgi.com
From: Richard Piotter richfile@rconnect.com
Date: Fri, 12 Feb 1999 22:10:27 -0600
Subject: [alt-beam] Re: Turbot!
Turbot 1.0 used mercury switches and had a configurable DIP switches. It used a
CMOS Binary counter, which according to the BEAM games handbook was it's only
chip. I think I'm going to use a cordless phone battery for it's main power
source, and maybe add solar panels later. I assume the panels could charge the
battery as long as the voltage excedes the battey. Maybe 2 of the large
soalrbotics panels, if I add them. I suppose i'll have to make the battery
removable if I were to enter my turbot into a BEAM competition. I think I know
how to power the thing work nicely. My turbot appears to be smaller than the one
in the image. Interestingly, the robot cost only $27 to build, and looked very
interesting. The book says that it is "Now inopperative due to aggressive feline
intervention"! Hehe! Poor thing!
According to the book, the mercury switches determine if the leg move forward or
backward, or if one leg moves or both. There must be quite a number of
combinations. It doesn't say how many switches were used, or how they actualy
are wired to anything. Just that it used the counter chip and some mercury
switches, and that it was configurable with a set of DIP switches (which can be
clearly seen in the image). Also, the canadian coin shown, is it dime or quarter
size (I'm not sure the value of the coin, so I don't know which it is. It's a
B&W image).
I'm going to look at solarbotics, but I have a lot of tiny mercury switches (14)
and I'd like to try doing the configurable counter/Hg Switch type of turbot. It
seems very interesting, and it looks like a good design. It's a shame it got
broken! I'd like to "reincarnate" it.
--
Richard Piotter
richfile@rconnect.com
The Richfiles Robotics & TI web page:
http://members.xoom.com/richfiles
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