Hey Guys,
I've read lots on the forum, and posted a hand full of times, but I thought it was about time I launched my first major project (well, my second really, I converted a wall-e, but I thought there was enough of those on here
).
So here is announcing OmniMC, an Omnibot 2000 media centre
The idea is to make him all RC and to also house a Raspberry PI running RaspBMC as the media centre bit. I'll then add some speakers and maybe some under-bot lighting
I'm wondering if then I can control the whole thing with one of these:
Other than that, I'm kinda just winging it and seeing what other bits and pieces I come up with.
To start with though, I've done the usual thing of gutting him and sticking him through the dishwasher
So right now, he is prepped and ready to go.
I've already got my EZ-Robot kit, and a few components such as 6v battery
Some blue replacement bulbs
My Raspberry PI (which arrived today) and I've just won a screen for his chest
While I'm waiting for some other bits, I've also been looking at making some replacement tires which you can see details of in one of my other posts
So that's pretty much the state of play at the moment. I'm pretty much a novice at all this, so I'm looking forward to the challenge. Lets see if I've bitten off more than I can chew
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hello i had a question after watching the video. how did you get your ezb to run off of your mac? i thought it was only compatible with windows.
thanks Aaron
Hi @Aaron, I run windows via bootcamp.
@matt thats for sure a new way to power the shoulder movements! Khudos. Using dark tint like 5 or 2 percent will give you that blue glowing dot in the center. Im still contemplating somthing like that. If you do tint you will need to cut a piece of glass or plexi because tint wont stick well to textured surfaces.
Hey @josh, I have applied a small circle of tint. It's just an 80% silver film that sticks on to the plastice replacement lens cover I made. I just cut out some small discs, the size of the original diffused area and stuck them on. If you look at the last side view picture of the head, you can just make them out. They do make a subtle difference, so a nice tweak.
Regarding the arms, they do work really well, so am pleased with the solution. I've just got to make a bracket for the servo now
A small update but I decided to design a bracket to hold my servos in place inside the arm and sent the design of to shapeways to have it 3d printed. Well they arrived yesterday and they work great.
The bracket only holds the rear of the servo in place but I figure the front is held by the cutout in the arm and the gear also holds it into place so it feels pretty sturdy.
I need to make the cutout on the other arm now though and make them match
That's looking like a very nice build. It looks like you were the winner of one of the Omni2000s I was bidding on (going by you only having the cover of the control unit - unless two have been on ebay like that).
If you ever need replacement batteries quickly, toolstation do the 6v 4ah for 7.47 Sealed Lead Acid Battery so on par with ebay prices without the wait (if you have a toolstation locally). It's where I picked up the replacement for my Omni.
Also, with the whole XBMC/RasPi based media centre, what are your intentions with it? I'm presuming you wouldn't want to watch a film on the Omni... would you?.. Re-skinning the UI isn't too difficult a task, I spent some time playing with skins back when I was running it on an Xbox, and it's (apparently) got easier since then, XBMC forums are generally helpful anyway so I'm sure it wont be a problem. That said, I rarely read text in my XBMC setups, it's all DVD/CD cases to scroll through and select.
I'll certainly be watching this one closely as the Omni2000 is a project I hope to tackle in the future (although not anytime soon as this isn't a cheap hobby!) and with that screen being as perfect a fit as you could get I'm sure I'll be "borrowing" ideas.
So tonight I decided to convert the other arm (man, it's faster the second time
). I went ahead and recorded a video of them working.
I need to tweak the settings in ARC a little, but I think they work well enough for me.I've got some plexi glass and filler in to finish off the head, so I'll be looking at that next.
@RichMR2 heh, you are the second person that said they were bidding on my Omni
Thanks for the tip on the battery, although I have already baught some power sonic batteries from a guy on ebay, so am happy with those for the time being.
I haven't looked at skinning the XBMC just yet, so glad to hear its not that hard. I think it's going to have to be very image based, as the screen isn't that great at showing text. But hey, it's all in the name of a bit of fun
Whoa this has to be the coolest omnibot 2k conversion ever! You could probably sell those 3D printed brackets
To smooth the arm servo movements, try setting the servo speed for those ports to 2 or 3... I find that helps remove the jerkiness
PS, you might want to upgrade your ARC ... It looks pretty old