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We hold robot-building workshops throughout the year for school classes, boy
scouts, girl guides, etc, using kits that we assemble (to keep costs down).
Commercial kits can be very expensive, especially if each student is to have
one. We have several robot kits using tethers and one kit is autonomous. The
beginner one (RoboCritter) is targetted at grades 3 to 6.  The SumoBot and
MiniMax are targetted at grades 6 to 10 (or higher).  The simpler ones do
not use gear boxes.  The older kids assemble their own controllers as well
as the gear boxes, which introduces some variables (speed vs. torque).
There are tracked and wheeled versions of some of the robots.

Early versions of these robots have been used on the exhibit floor and are
highly engaging (playing robot soccer, for example).  These are also entered
into our annual Robot Games competition.

For more information, please contact me directly:

George Wurtak
Science Council of Manitoba
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-----Original Message-----

Date:    Mon, 13 Nov 2006 15:49:42 -0800
From:    Elib Crist-Dwyer <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: Re: Help with Robots

Hello,

We've used a robot called "The Scribbler" from Parallex on the
floor with our visitors with some success.  It has several
preprogrammed operations, one of which is a drawing program that
directs the robots to draw simple patterns on a sheet of paper.

Our visitors then took home the sheets that the robot drew on
for them.

Elib Crist-Dwyer
ScienceWorks Hands-On Museum
Ashland, OR

>
> Hello
>
>
>
> I am currently designing an exhibit which will be called
> "Inventor's
> Lab"
> and we are looking into the possibility of using robotics
> within the
> exhibit. Some that we have looked at are Lego Mindstorms,
> Crickets, and
> the
> Sandwich Robot. I was curious to see if any other museum had
> any
> experience
> with any of these robots and what their experiences were such
> as
> durability,
> public opinion, cost effectiveness, etc, etc. I am also open
> to any
> other
> robot ideas that I may not know about. Thanks!

> Christie Greene

> STEP Coordinator

> Catawba Science Center
>
>

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