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JPL Open-Source Rover Project Based on the Rovers on Mars

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Re: JPL Open-Source Rover Project Based on the Rovers on Mars

#11

Post by xupybd »

gabcoh wrote: post #9

This seems really awesome, but my God is it expensive. Maybe I am not reading correctly but it seems like just the nuts and bolts from McMaster cost $230 and that's still excluding the electronics and additional hardware! I guess I'll have to save up a bit before I can play with my own minituare rover. edit: the motors also are going to cost around $500

Yeah they list the cost as That's a little pricey for most. But I'd imagine a school class would be able to afford that if it was going to be worked on by 30 - 40 students?

Re: JPL Open-Source Rover Project Based on the Rovers on Mars

#12

Post by [deleted] »

gabcoh wrote: post #9

This seems really awesome, but my God is it expensive. Maybe I am not reading correctly but it seems like just the nuts and bolts from McMaster cost $230 and that's still excluding the electronics and additional hardware! I guess I'll have to save up a bit before I can play with my own minituare rover. edit: the motors also are going to cost around $500

[deleted]

Re: JPL Open-Source Rover Project Based on the Rovers on Mars

#13

Post by jacobolus »

TaylorAlexander wrote: post #5

My coworker Liv designed that! I don’t know the original purpose but it’s a fun project. I’ve also got my own open source Rover design if you like this kind of thing: https://youtu.be/DXPmqCd0r04

It’s very confusing having the frame rate of the camera and the rotation of the wheels in sync so that the wheels appear completely stationary while the rover drives forward.

Re: JPL Open-Source Rover Project Based on the Rovers on Mars

#14

Post by dbcurtis »

gabcoh wrote: post #9

This seems really awesome, but my God is it expensive. Maybe I am not reading correctly but it seems like just the nuts and bolts from McMaster cost $230 and that's still excluding the electronics and additional hardware! I guess I'll have to save up a bit before I can play with my own minituare rover. edit: the motors also are going to cost around $500

Hmmm... so I can see you haven't tried to build a practical robot lately. $2500 is approximately nothing for a robot that has the specs of this one. Sure, I've built $10 robots and $80 robots. But they don't do what this one does.

Re: JPL Open-Source Rover Project Based on the Rovers on Mars

#15

Post by dokem »

gabcoh wrote: post #9

This seems really awesome, but my God is it expensive. Maybe I am not reading correctly but it seems like just the nuts and bolts from McMaster cost $230 and that's still excluding the electronics and additional hardware! I guess I'll have to save up a bit before I can play with my own minituare rover. edit: the motors also are going to cost around $500

Consider cost per number of hours of your time this project this will occupy. It's probably around that of other common pass-times.

Re: JPL Open-Source Rover Project Based on the Rovers on Mars

#16

Post by ummonk »

gabcoh wrote: post #9

This seems really awesome, but my God is it expensive. Maybe I am not reading correctly but it seems like just the nuts and bolts from McMaster cost $230 and that's still excluding the electronics and additional hardware! I guess I'll have to save up a bit before I can play with my own minituare rover. edit: the motors also are going to cost around $500

McMaster is extremely overpriced. Good for just ordering stuff for quick prototypes where you don't need to shop on price, but otherwise, it's easy to end up paying multiple times as much for some item as you would if you found a good OEM supplier for each component (and this isn't even considering Chinese OEM suppliers).

Re: JPL Open-Source Rover Project Based on the Rovers on Mars

#18

Post by AzMoo_ »

gabcoh wrote: post #9

This seems really awesome, but my God is it expensive. Maybe I am not reading correctly but it seems like just the nuts and bolts from McMaster cost $230 and that's still excluding the electronics and additional hardware! I guess I'll have to save up a bit before I can play with my own minituare rover. edit: the motors also are going to cost around $500

You can source nearly all of this for about half the price if you look around a bit and substitute some of the parts for cheaper equivalents. The wheels are a great example. You can pick up the same things from China for half the price or even use a different style. The motor drivers are pricey for what they are and could be replaced with many other, cheaper drivers.

Re: JPL Open-Source Rover Project Based on the Rovers on Mars

#19

Post by TaylorAlexander »

jacobolus wrote: post #13
TaylorAlexander wrote: post #5

My coworker Liv designed that! I don’t know the original purpose but it’s a fun project. I’ve also got my own open source Rover design if you like this kind of thing: https://youtu.be/DXPmqCd0r04

It’s very confusing having the frame rate of the camera and the rotation of the wheels in sync so that the wheels appear completely stationary while the rover drives forward.

Right! It was weird to watch when editing.

Re: JPL Open-Source Rover Project Based on the Rovers on Mars

#20

Post by [deleted] »

gabcoh wrote: post #9

This seems really awesome, but my God is it expensive. Maybe I am not reading correctly but it seems like just the nuts and bolts from McMaster cost $230 and that's still excluding the electronics and additional hardware! I guess I'll have to save up a bit before I can play with my own minituare rover. edit: the motors also are going to cost around $500

[deleted]
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