MK02-01 – Obstacle Avoidance Car

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About Course

In this course, you will learn how to build, wire, and program a robot car from scratch (step-by-step)! This car will drive around avoiding obstacles all on its own. It’s the perfect project to tackle the STEM trifecta; mechanics, electronics, and programming. Unlike many robotics kits, this is not plug-and-play. We’re designing and wiring all our own circuits!

You’ll receive the kit by mail, and follow along with video tutorials that explain the concepts and then build the kit with you. This course is taught by a professional engineer (and certified industrial robot programmer) with degrees in both mechanical engineering and computer science, who has been working as a factory automation equipment designer for nearly a decade. We’ll walk you through everything you need to build your very first robot, even if you have absolutely zero previous experience!

Recommended for ages 8+. You must have a laptop with a USB-C port (or an adapter, sold separately).

The account with which you purchase this kit will be the account used to access the online video content.

Teachers – contact us for educator pricing.

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What Will You Learn?

  • Programming
  • Electrical Circuits & Components
  • Ultrasonic Distance Sensors
  • Servo Motors
  • DC Motor Control
  • Battery Packs
  • Autonomous Logic
  • Analog vs Digital Electrical Signals

Course Content

Introduction
A basic overview of how to navigate the course.

  • Welcome
    02:42

Basic Circuits
Learn about the basics of electricity and how circuits are built. Design different circuits to make LEDs light up, and explore the various tactile inputs available to us like buttons, toggles and switches.

Programming Basics
Adding a microcontroller to our circuit allows us to write programs that will automate various actions. Modify your LED circuit to allow the controller to turn our LED on and off for us automatically without the use of buttons.

Intermediate Programming
Organize your programs to make them more powerful by including custom functions. Build a circuit and use these new tools to control more complex components such as a 7-segment display.

Advanced Programming
Adding some more programming tools to allow us to interact with different kinds of components. Using global variables, conditional statements, custom function arguments and loops will allow us to create more complex circuits and explore the difference between digital and analog components such as an RGB LED.

Basic Inputs
Learn to receive and interpret input signals to your microcontroller so that it can interact with its environment. Using buttons for physical inputs will allow us to add another layer of automation and interact with our robot. We'll use the momentary button to control the value on our 7-segment display.

DC Motors
Some components require more power than others. Learn to create circuits for more power-hungry components like motors, and the associated programming techniques we need to control these components.

Ultrasonic Distance Sensors
Learn about sound waves and how they propagate. We'll use an ultrasonic sensor to measure the distance to the nearest object by measuring the time it takes for a sound pulse to echo back to our robot. Write the program to control our sensor and wire the necessary circuit.

Servomotor Control
Unlike DC motors, servomotors can be sent to a specific position. We'll use these motors to control the direction that our distance sensor is facing. Learn to wire a servomotor circuit and write the program to tell it which direction to face.

Car Kit Build
Assemble the chassis for our car that will serve as the platform for all our components. Mount the breadboard with our circuit, the servomotor, ultrasonic sensor, battery pack and wheels onto our car. Use the battery pack for power.

The Final Circuit
Combine everything we have learned about ultrasonic distance sensors, DC motors, servomotors and LEDs into our final car circuit. Add in a maintain button to turn our car on or off.

Obstacle Avoidance Programming Logic 1
Add all the basic functionality to control all the components connected to our car. Set up the global variables and custom functions for our motors and sensors, and make sure everything is initialized based on the wiring of our circuit.

Obstacle Avoidance Programming Logic 2
Write the main logic tree that will allow our robot to make decisions about how it will navigate. Fine tune and test the various parameters to make it drive around without hitting anything.

Housekeeping
Some optional final steps for cleaning up our completed project.

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