This Friday, June 8th, I will be closing registration for two weeks of robotics camp in June. As with all of our camps, you can register online or print and mail the registration forms.

Current status for our June camps:
June 11th -15th (South Tampa – PM Only). Camp is confirmed. We have a few open spots and I will accept registrations through June 10th.
June 18th – 22nd (Riverview @ Kid’s Community College). Both the morning and afternoon sessions are still below the minimum number of registrations. I will notify all registered campers on Saturday, June 9th if the camp is cancelled.
June 25th – 29th (North Tampa @ Messiah Lutheran Church). Both the morning and afternoon sessions are still below the minimum number of registrations. I will notify all registered campers on Saturday, June 9th if the camp is cancelled.

All July camps (Lutz Prep and Trinity) have plenty of campers and are confirmed.

Registrations for the August boot camps are light. I will post a status update for these camps once they are confirmed.

If you’ve registered for one of our camps and are considering a second camp, don’t forget we offer a $20 discount for siblings and for each additional camp session.

If you are on the fence and considering the camps on June 18th and June 25th, now is the time to commit. If we are able to confirm the camps, I will extend the registration deadline to allow additional campers to enroll. If the camp is canceled, it will be permanently removed from the schedule. In the event we cancel any camps, paid campers will have the opportunity to switch to another session or receive a full refund for their fees.

Don’t forget, robotic summer camp registration for all weeks and locations is still open! We have camps available in North Tampa, Riverview, Lutz, South Tampa, and Trinity. Dates, locations, and all the details are on our camp page.

For our Monday club at Kid’s Community College, we decided to take a break from the FLL mats and work on something a little more open ended.

I’m sure most everyone is familiar with the crazy TV Show Wipeout. We are going to build a few sections of their brutally fun obstacle course using the NXT motors and sensors. The build will be approximately at Minifig scale.

Since the KCC Robotics Club is going to take a break for the summer, I thought it best to pick something fun that we could accomplish in just a few weeks. For this build, I’m busting out lots of interesting bits for the kids to build with. I think the tricky parts will challenge them nicely. For instance, the Sweeper will require building two concentric sections which will need to rotate in opposite directions. The punching wall will need to at least appear to be randomly pushing LEGO bricks out to knock “contestants” from the ledge.

I’m not sure if we’ll have time to build the Wipe Out Zone, but it will have some interesting challenges as well. Perhaps I’ll save it for summer camp!

It seems the NXTified Astro Blaster’s game turned out to be a popular idea! For the last couple of weeks, we’ve been building up two drivable robots that will be remote controlled using Mindsensor’s Sony PlayStation 2 Controller interfaces for NXT.

So far, we have a platform, a hopper to store the balls, and a ball lifting mechanism to pull the balls into the robot.

Still to accomplish are motorized wheels, steering, a cannon, and targets.

For the base, we settled on Black Boat Hovercraft Bodies. They have a limited number of Technic style holes, so we are adding some of our own. You can see them in this picture of the platform with the ball catcher on board. They are along the skirt just below the ball catcher. The ball catcher is a Duplo Loading Chute.

This is the rear view with the ball retriever installed. We’ve been testing it with the LEGO 41mm Foam Ball but at about a buck a piece, I decided instead to get a bulk order of ping pong balls online. Ping pong balls are around 40mm and I think they’ll be a little more likely to trigger the targets than those foam balls which weigh even less.

Another view of the work in progress.

The key unusual LEGO items we have used so far for this build.

We’re wrapping up ButlerBot and our North Tampa Robotics Club is now in search of a new project idea!

Contender #1 is a LEGO MINDSTORMS version of the Buzz Lightyear Astroblasters ride at DisneyQuest. Here is a fan video.

Each robot will be outfitted with a target. I have a nice collection of LEGO foam balls that we can use. Using PS2 game controllers, we will drive the robots around to pick up the balls and try to shoot the targets on the opponent’s robot. A successful hit will cause the other robot to spin wildly and flash lights for five seconds. We’ll have to add a fancy scoring system too.

Post a comment if you have other ideas!

Our North Tampa Robotics Club is bringing ButlerBot to the Tampa Bay Mini Maker Faire on March 31st! Our little group has been hard at working building an NXT robot controlled by an XBox 360 Kinect controller. We’re excited to be there to show off what the kids and their dad’s accomplished.

What is a Maker Faire? It is a place where we celebrate the processes of learning and doing, and where we share our discoveries, curiosities, inventions, innovations and ideas as inquisitive, explorative amateurs. Tampa Bay Mini Maker is a celebration of regional do-it-yourself (DIY) character and spirit.

There will be dozens of other displays and a food truck rally. This family friendly event is being held at the University Area Community Development Center at 14013 North 22nd Street, Tampa, Florida 33613. Tickets are $5 if you order online, or $8 at the door. You can order them in advance here.

I know many of you are already planning your summers so we have been working extra hard to find a venue for our South Tampa Robotics Camp. I’m pleased to announce our first session is now open for registration the week of June 11-15, 2012.

There will be many all new activities along with some of the kid’s favorites from last year.

In addition to South Tampa, we currently have weeks available in North Tampa, Lutz, and in Riverview.

Please visit us at http://inanimatereason.com/camp for all of the details and to see the complete schedule. Camps will be filled on a first-come, first-served basis and space is limited!

We also still have spots open in our community robotics clubs meeting now on Mondays and Thursdays in Riverview and Carrollwood. Details are online at our camp page. The North Tampa group is up to pretty exciting things! Check out our latest blog post about the robotic gripper we built for ButlerBot!

For the last few weeks, a number of kids at MacFarlane Park IB Elementary have been working on ideas for a couple of GBC modules. One of the kids decided he wanted to build a ball shooter to feed a ramp he built using some large, quarter round slopes. I helped him put his ideas to work and we came up with this:

There will be a liftarm across the top to help the gears stay engaged and it’s being displayed upside down to show off the mechanism. The H-pins are offset to keep the vertical gear centered over the two idler gears. The only trick will be accurately feeding it the balls. A motor will power the shooter from the red axle. It works pretty smoothly.