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Ask HN: Courses/textbook recommendations for studying robotics?

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Re: Ask HN: Courses/textbook recommendations for studying robotics?

#11

Post by tomp »

antiviral wrote: post #7
auxym wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Second that. Similar questions get posted pretty often in engineering subreddits and it's difficult to answer as robotics is so multi-disciplinary. Very few people in this world are skilled enough in embedded programming, PCB design (motor control and sensors), materials and structures, dynamics and kinematics, controls and machine design (CAD, selecting manufacturing processes, selecting various COTS mechanical part…

Good advice. Can you recommend the names of any off-the-shelf robotic arms or tools that can be modified or hacked? Any good standard starting points for controller software?

I recently researched "cheap" (not really but not super extra expensive) robot arms.

(Disclaimer: I haven't bought any of them, so can't say anything about the quality.)

UFactory Lite $3900 https://www.ufactory.cc/product-page/ufactory-lite-6-kit

Dorna 2 $4200 https://dorna.ai/product/dorna-2/

ReBeL cobot €5000 https://www.igus.si/product/20962?artNr=REBEL-6DOF-01

Interbotix https://www.trossenrobotics.com/robotic-arms/ros-research-ar...

DOBOT $2700 https://www.trossenrobotics.com/dobot-mg400-industrial-deskt...

Wlkata Mirobot $2000 https://www.wlkata.com/products/professional-kit-of-wlkata-m...

Re: Ask HN: Courses/textbook recommendations for studying robotics?

#13

Post by petrw »

The really big shift in ai in a sense was to reject the sense-model- plan- act cycle. I continue to see researchers assuming SMPA so although "everyone" knows this,"Intelligence without representation" by Brooks is essential. The alternative is sense-act in one layer, and model-plan over the top.

Re: Ask HN: Courses/textbook recommendations for studying robotics?

#14

Post by pgorczak »

Nonlinear systems and control could be something that’s useful to get into regarding legged robots or exoskeletons. It’s not covered in depth by many general robotics textbooks but there’s a great lecture including fantastic interactive notebook material at http://underactuated.mit.edu/

Re: Ask HN: Courses/textbook recommendations for studying robotics?

#15

Post by jstmm »

Kevin Lynch has a great course "Modern Robotics: Mechanics, Planning, and Control Specialization" on coursera. It covers the key ideas in robotics at a high level (however it leaves out perception). I recommend it for people interested in getting started on this topic.

https://www.coursera.org/specializations/modernrobotics#cour...

Re: Ask HN: Courses/textbook recommendations for studying robotics?

#16

Post by egl2021 »

petrw wrote: post #13

The really big shift in ai in a sense was to reject the sense-model- plan- act cycle. I continue to see researchers assuming SMPA so although "everyone" knows this,"Intelligence without representation" by Brooks is essential. The alternative is sense-act in one layer, and model-plan over the top.

I apparently wasn't paying attention: can you elaborate on what it is that "everyone" knows?

Re: Ask HN: Courses/textbook recommendations for studying robotics?

#18

Post by anfractuosity »

I bought a 6DOF robot arm a while ago, which uses servos driven by PWM, which I found quite fun.

It was only around £70 for the servos + metal framework. I drive it with a Pi and a PCA9685 based I2C board.

I was driving with a 5V supply, but it looks like the servos can run at 6V, which I need to try, as the bottom servo in the arm doesn't seem to have quite enough power.

I'd like to sometime try to 'teach' it to draw with a pen (however badly), 'Inverse kinematics' feels rather scary though, so wonder if anyone might have any very basic tutorials on this.

Tangentially related, I just bought 'The Ultimate Guide To DIY Animatronics' yesterday, which I'm looking forward to reading when it arrives.

And have been watching a few videos on animatronics such as:

* https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y0R8-F4TmPI - 'Show and Tell: Animatronic Raven Kit!'

* https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uNIfx0Xddzc - 'How Realistic Animatronics Are Made For Movies & TV | Movies Insider'

Curious if anyone has any recommendations for videos/books in this area?

Re: Ask HN: Courses/textbook recommendations for studying robotics?

#19

Post by cashsterling »

Kevin Lynch's book is free and very good: http://hades.mech.northwestern.edu/index.php/Modern_Robotics - someone already mentioned his course.

The Robotics resources and texts by Peter Corke are good: https://petercorke.com/ -also has this good related course: https://robotacademy.net.au/

"Controls Engineering in the FIRST Robotics Competition" by Tyler Veness is free and a good short reference: https://controls-in-frc.link/

Also add the MIT Robotics Series books: https://mitpress.mit.edu/series/intelligent-robotics-and-aut...

Algorithms for Decision Making is free and awesome: https://algorithmsbook.com/

Also looks really good (MIT Press hardcopy): https://introduction-to-autonomous-robots.github.io/

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