BattleBricks Blog

Check out this Lego Quiz over at SomeQuizzes.com!

Mike D’Amour just sent me over this link from youtube of another implementation of the RoboFlusher by xdmds200092:

Great job! It’s fun to see folks using our instructions!

Check out my latest creation, the iPhone Lego Robot Demo. This simple demo shows how to have iPhone’s Safari browser communicate with Lego Mindstorms via the NXT Light Sensor.

iPhone Lego Robot

We held an arena battle a couple of weeks ago, with four entrants. David Kincade fielded his first robot, and I finally got to build my ultimate spinner bot. Spintaho’s main weapon is driven by six lego motors, and it uses the NXT to drive and detect other robots. This is my first robot that uses two RCX’s and one NXT brick. Check out the pictures here, and the video here.

Check out our latest creation, the RoboFlush. It’s a Lego NXT Mindstorms Robot that automatically flushes the toilet!

I’m always on the lookout for interesting interface devices between the computer and the real world. Cheap is also good. I came across a nice looking mini servo controller from Pololu here: http://www.pololu.com/products/pololu/0207/.

Also, I’ve been thinking about trying out some of these too:http://www.phidgets.com/. They are input and output devices with an easy to use USB interface built in. Seems like you could create quite a few interesting things with them.

Here are some newly posted photos of our most recent battle. Doug’s robot came in first with about 20 balls removed from the arena. He also had the most entertaining bot, which would fire a ping pong ball about 10 feet or more through the air. It was a riot. Will’s robot was over-engineered as usual and removed about a dozen balls from the arena. Mike’s robot was also entertaining. After hitting the wall a couple of times it usually would fall into pieces. He successfully removed two ping pong balls from the arena.

I do enjoy a good Lego model.  Over at Fascinating Lego Model of the Day, I was a bit overwelmed!  Each day this blogger highlights a new lego project.  Now if only they all came with instructions!

Over at Slashdot, we learn that Google, Intel, and Microsoft, the GooInMi team as I like to call them, are funding Carnegie Melon’s TeRK, a Telepresence Robot that anyone can build for under $1000. The Qwerk controller alone costs $349. It makes the NXT kit sound cheap! Maybe the GooInMi team should focus their efforts on funding Lego Robotics. It’s amazing what you can do with this stuff! Here’s a link to the original article.

Well, its about time we did something with this website of ours.  BattleBricks.com still has a 1990’s feel to it, I know, so we’re moving into the 21st century with Wordpress Blogging Software!  We’ll be posting our various battles and other Lego activities here, along with anything we find interesting around the net with respect to good ol’ robotic mayhem.  If you have an interesting link or would like a mention here on the blog, send us an email or post a message over on our new forums!