
Carlos230023
Hi all. I've had a good look around the website and can't really find a solid answer for a few questions I have so I'm hoping I can find some safe advice from some experienced EZ-Robot users.
Love the look of the dev kit! I have an UP! Plus printer and lots of experience using it largely for RC flying (aircraft and multirotor parts). I stumbled across the site while procrastinating on thingiverse. Struggling to find justification with the wife to buy a hex robot when she says I have enough hexacopters to go round. A thought occurred...
I'm putting together a man shed as a workshop in the garden, a fair size to work on bigger stuff. It will have mains power, 12v LED rail lighting, a 2Kw heater and a 12,000btu A/C unit (I'll be doing temperature critical fibre glassing work in there). Electronic door locks and actuators, big extract fan etc...
Basically I figure instead of building a robot, why not automate the manshed with the EZ-B, have my own J.A.R.V.I.S. (Of iron man fame) with the use of an MP3 trigger. I could walk in, ask it to warm the place up to 22 deg C and turn on the lighting and extract fan after it closes the doors. All at the same time running security with a servo mounted EZ-wireless camera.
The first question I have, is does the EZ-B have an internal microphone for voice commands, or an option to attach an external
Mic? All the videos and tutorials only mention having used the internal mic on a laptop/PC.
My second question, which I guess is slightly more important, this EZ-B doesn't need to be WiFi connected to a computer to run all its functions does it? Again, it may seem obvious but I've yet to see the paragraph or video that explicitly says once the code and instructions are loaded on the EZ-B, it can run autonomously.
Question the third, is there a voice generator section to the software? I.E. Can a word or sentence be written in and the EZ-B (again, without being permanently wifi tethered to a PC) figures out how to voice it (such as with apples "Siri")?
Many thanks in advance to all whom take part in this thread!
CJ
"Shed"
"Yes CJ?"
"Can you remember the number 42.5 for me"
"Of course sir"
-Moments later-
"Right, now what's a third of that?"
... Tell me you weren't reading that with RDJ and Jarvis's voice in your head :P.
CJ
CJ
Also, if we were to have the features of a PC (for example having an operating system, etc) then it would cost as much as a PC
So instead the EZ-B provides hardware extension to a PC. There will be a USB shield for the EZ-B v4, but not until after the new year. The EZ-B v4 is two PCB's sandwiched together. The USB shield will be a replacement for the WIFI I/O shield of the EZ-B v4.
You can have a calculator that you can speak to with no trouble. you can use the PandoraBot to create a Jarvis personality. EZ-Script can be embedded within the PandoraBot responses to do calculations, get local weather, and more.
I'm fine with all the mechanical stuff (a commercial heating engineer by trade). It's the countless lines of (to me) meaningless code that I stumble on. I kind of see this as a kick ass version of the Lego mind storms V1 kit I had as a kid many moons ago. Point and click programming that let's me enjoy the result without having spent 4 years doing a degree to figure out the code.
Hats off to you DJ Sures. EZ-B is a very exciting project. And maby after the shed is automated I might convince the missus to give the coffee machine a personality and arms to grab cups and dispense milk, dressed up as Clean-&-Go-Mo from Wall-e :P.
Kindest regards, CJ
@Carlos230023 , Welcome! We're in between versions of the EZB (3 & 4). We're still a little in the dark on the specs of V4 but it is known to have an onboard sound AMP. This should mean you'll be able to run your MP3 Trigger right through the EZB and not a stand alone amp. As far as a microphone, I think you'll have to have it attached to your computer and let Win 7 or 8 handle the Voice Recognition. The ARC software does a great job of intergreating the power of Windows and EZB.
CJ
Check out Homeseer Fairly pricey, but also very mature product set, or Smarthome for many many more options.
Alan
Here's a low budget drawing for your enjoyment I did using pics of things you want to control :). You need the ezb v4 , relays, wire , connectors , solder and iron and tip120 switching transistors to trip the relays. Oh and ofcourse a pc to run it all.
Wow Jstarne1, 'A' for effort :P. I'm not worried about the switch gear side of things. I'm a domestic and commercial heating, ventilation and mechanical engineer by day. It's the programming side of things that'll slow me down if anything. The door locks and actuator will be air driven. I'm putting an atmosphere controlled 3D printing cabinet in too. Humidity and temperature controlled filtered air. I was going to run the controls from an arduino but tapping into the EZ-B seems easier.
I suppose at this point I'm running out of ports, perhaps the robotic assist arm attached to the ceiling will have to wait (for the jobs when you need three hands, one to hold something, one to hold something else and one to apply glue).
I'll make a list.
1. MP3 trigger (unless voice commands as DJ suggested earlier can be generated on the attached PC and played through 2. that)
3. Extract fan
4. Heater
5. Room thermistor
6. A/C
7. Compressor
8. Door actuator
9. Door open/close microswitches (figure I'd do two on one channel with different resistor values)
10. Security cam Pan (doubt ill need tilt)
11. Lighting
12. Door locks
13. Printing cabinet dehumidifier
14. Printing cabinet heater
15. Printing cabinet air circulation
16. Printing cabinet thermistor
17. Printing cabinet humidistat
As for the robotic assist arm, I guess it would have at a minimum;
2 axis shoulder
1 axis elbow
3 axis claw (grip, rotate & tilt)
And possibly a rail along the top of the shed to traverse the space :P.
So there's another 7 outputs and that's an arm with no sensors.
Anyone know of a relay board that takes a PWM input to control several relays, one at a time or all together :P.
CJ
Am I right in thinking there is a good stepper motor control board available that works well with the EZ-B? Something that works on a PWM signal (for the robot arm). Thinking getting a second EZ-B might be a wise idea. That way I could do magnetic induction position sensors for the robot arm.
Of all the hairbrained ideas I've come up with over the years I feel this one is genuinely feasible.
CJ