Playing with Lego Mindstorm

We're doing a AI and Robotics Workshop under IEE NED Chapter. Uvais bhai was generous enough to leave his Lego Mindstorm kit with me so I could mess around with it. He has an extra RCX 2.0 module which he has borrowed from Basil (another cousin, 10 years old).

Here are the first two vehicles I have designed. The bigger one will be the star of tomorrow's workshop! It is fitted with two light sensors which help the vehicle steer through a black line. The second one is fitted with two touch sensors and is programmed to simply reverse the direction of motors to forward and backwards upon touching a physical object.

Lego Mindstorm is very simple and it is extremely intuitive. There are a number of cool plugins available for Lego, such as a Video camera and a bunch of other sensors. The only drawback is that it has very few input and output ports. Although they can be stacked but I couldn't see any way to multiplex them using available parts in the kit. I don't have a user manual handy.

Playing with Lego Mindstorm reminded me of the good old school days when I used to play with the DC motors, make my own portable fan and small gadgets and of the good old Meccano which I received on a birthday. I designed so many things using it... once I tried to use my toy car's motor to drive the pulley in a lifting truck I designed using meccano but the motor couldn't take the load. I wish I had my digital camera then or maybe there will be a device in the future which will let me capture an image of whatever I have in the mind! Well, it does exist in Star Trek! I guess I'll have to order one from Starfleet.