Turtlebot

From Sluggish Software Wiki

Contents 1 Introduction 2 Components 3 Turtlebot and friends 4 Review articles 5 Maps 6 Navigation 6.1 Settings 6.2 Videos 6.3 Button Box 6.4 Drinks Carrier

Introduction

This is a mobile robot which I received as a review unit from iheartrobotics.com. It uses the same ROS software which I used on the GROK2 robot, and has an onboard netbook (Asus EeePC 1215N) and Kinect RGBD sensor.

Components

Some photos of the components of the Turtlebot.

• The box which it arrived in
• iRobot Create packaging
• iRobot Create battery
• iRobot Create in its box
• iRobot Create empty box
• USB connector lead between the iRobot Create and netbook
• Underside of the iRobot Create
• The mounting of the Kinect RGBD sensor
• Netbook packaging
• Gyro and circuit breaker board which plugs into the iRobot Create (underside view)
• Gyro and circuit breaker board which plugs into the iRobot Create (above view)
• Shelves
• A sticker
• Struts used to assemble the shelves
• USB drive used to install the software

Turtlebot and friends

Some photos of the Turtlebot in comparison to other robots.

• Turtlebot, GROK2 and Rodney robots
• Turtlebot, GROK2 and Rodney robots (side view)
• Turtlebot, GROK2 and Rodney robots (rear view)
• Turtlebot and GROK2 robots (closer side view)
• Turtlebot and GROK2 robots (closer front view)
• Turtlebot and GROK2 robots (ground level view)

Review articles

• Creating a bootable USB drive for use with ROS
• Testing the Turtlebot
• Getting Stuck
• Mapping the Environment

Maps

• Map created at 5cm occupancy grid resolution
• Map created at 2cm occupancy grid resolution

Navigation

Settings

Discovering appropriate settings for navigation can be difficult, and this is often a problem with any feedback system where reality is in the loop. Here are the values I used, together with the 2cm resolution map.

• Turtlebot Local Costmap Parameters
• Turtlebot Global Costmap Parameters
• Turtlebot Common Costmap Parameters
• Turtlebot Base Local Planner Parameters

Videos

Media:turtlebot_navigate1.ogv

Here the robot navigates from one end of the house to another, but gets stuck at the final doorway

Media:turtlebot_navigate2.ogv

A successful navigation to from one end of the house to the other and back again

Button Box

In order to be able to easily control the Turtlebot without requiring a separate laptop or PC I constructed a box containing some buttons attached to an Arduino, which could then be plugged into the onboard netbook via USB.

More details about the button box can be found here.

Drinks Carrier

An additional drinks carrier attachment was also tested. This enabled the Turtlebot to deliver drinks. Pressure sensors were connected to the Arduino's analog inputs in order to detect the presence or absence of drinks.