Quote:
Originally Posted by Adam Shapiro
That sounds pretty awesome! What kind of GPS units are you using? Are you really going to code for it in pbasic? That could get very interesting very fast..
Personally I build autonomous cars. I'm working on the Cornell DARPA Urban Challenge team (yes, the competition that preceeded the videos of the roach-bot). I built an HCS12-run actuation controller for the car that is controlled via ethernet, as well as a synchronized, ethernet-enabled, distributed sensor network. At this point I've designed and prototyped about 12 different devices that are now mostly functioning in our competition vehicle.
I would definitely say that had I not been able to do FIRST in high school I would not have been able to accomplish a fraction of what I have this past year for the team. For all the seniors I would recommend joining (or starting if necessary) a project team, research group, or other extra-curricular project once you graduate and go off to college. The work experience you'll get there is much closer to life after school than anything you'll get in your classes, and it's much more fun too!
|
No no no not pbasic, I want this thing to work!
But Like I said I am making the control system with a Atmel AVR series uC, which is programmed in C. You are able to program in PBASIC. But I feel in trying to make it simple by using PBASIC the language makes things harder. There are more commands and etc to use. I like using C it is really easy to me. For the GPS I have no idea right now. I haven't even finished the chassis. I am at college and started the chassis over spring break and left it home so the chassis should be done by the end of may. Which means rolling, I am hoping to get motors on by that time too so I can play with it. But once it is built the only thing I need to do is write the programs for it. But my plan is to have the gyro and encoders on before the GPS, that way I can say go this far then turn this much, etc. The only problem I am having is I am thinking I want a preprocessor for the encodes. Because this thing has a theoretical speed of like 18mph which means the processor will be really bogged down from interrupts. I am thinking I will just talk to the other processor via SPI. But that is all for another day to talk about.
@Elgin
Are those cars show cars or performance cars?
-John