It started out with lawn mower wheels like most others I have seen. I have always liked tracks so I went for it. I got some machine belts from my brother and rivited aluminum channel to them. I made the wheels out of PVC with turned down casters inside. I used a Stamp II for control and recently encorporated the Parallax 303MHz RF modules. In the front of the robot there is a color Panasonic board camera with a Radio Shack wireless audio/video transmitter. I can control the robot from my serial port with a Visual Basic program I wrote and view the video through a Connectix Quick Clip. I also set up another computer to be a dial up server so I can call it from somewhere else using a laptop. I use Netmeeting to view the video and can control it over the dial up connection with another Visual Basic program.

I would say I probably have a thousand dollars or so in it total. Upgrades have been made along the way. I used to use a modem, an inverter, and a 24VAC Camera. It worked well but only lasted about 20 minutes.

I have been messing around with it for about a year or so. I am always trying to make it better and am sort of hesitant to start another one fearing that this one may get used for parts.

Email: boom@nwlink.com