ROBOTIC KITS - Electronics For You

BUYERS’
GUIDE
ROBOTIC KITS
There is a high demand for programmable bots that can be interfaced to different
motors and sensors
The types of robotics kits
available in India have
grown rapidly in the last
four to fi ve years. The main
consumers are students,
mostly the engineering students, and
hobbyists.
Robotic kits help you to understand
the concepts behind the robots
and robot building in a concise manner.
These also let you program the
robot using simple visual programming
languages, helping you to have a
structured thinking towards problem
solving.
Many types of robotic kits are
available, including toy kits, hobby
kits and educational kits. In other
words, all kinds of machines that are
used to play with, experiment on and
educate, consist of robotic kits. These
may range from simple wheeled robots
to complex robots such as humanoids,
and from simple remote-controlled to
PC-controlled robots.
Do-it-yourself (DIY) kits are targeted
at those who want to learn how
to construct a robot. These usually
come with a small handbook explaining
how to put together the spare
parts provided in the box. On the
other hand, preassembled kits are for
those who want to learn to program a
robot or use a robot for their own research
applications. These come with
hardware schematics to explain the
circuits and good documentation for
Style
POPULARITY ON RISE
� UMA BANSAL
Qu-Bot from Robokits
programming interfaces.
User-confi gurable robots can be
classifi ed into three different sectors,
viz, consumer, industrial and toys.
Toy robots are experiencing a boom.
Easily reconfi gurable toy robot kits are
widely being used by youths for different
competitions.
You should prefer those kits which
give lots of features at low price and
are easy to build and learn. Line-follower
or remote-controlled robotic kits
are not programmable and generally
have a single function, but these are
affordable. Also available are imported
kits like LEGO, robonova humanoid,
robotic arm and hexapods, which are
really good but costly.
Robotic kits in India are offered by
players like MacNet Technology, Energid
Technologies, Rhydo Technologies,
Kits‘n’Spares (an EFY associate),
ThinkLABS, Techtronics Education,
Robokits, Robosoft Systems, Gridbots
Technologies and NEX Robotics.
Target groups
Main buyers of robotic kits in India
are engineering students. Making
these programmable mechanical devices
helps them in understanding
and conceptualising the theories involved.
Outside India, the consumers
are mostly hobbyists and researchers.
In terms of target groups, the robots
are being offered for:
1. Children up to the age of 16 and
their parents
2. Schools
3. Engineering students and hobbyists
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Buyers’
Guide
Vegakits plastic body robot
4. Professional colleges
5. Entertainment industry
building blocks
Robotic kits are great integrators as
they give insights into the fields of
mechanics, electronics as well as programming.
Most kits are intended for
easy assembly. Some kits come with
their own software, while some use
commonly available software.
Robotic hardware kits can be
mechanically configured to enable
different types of manipulation and
locomotion. Electronic modules can be
used to control the mechanics through
actuators as well as to gather information
from the hardware and the
environment with the help of sensors.
Software can be used to add behaviour
and intelligence.
The kit may include the brain of
the robot, motors, different types of
Boe-Bot robot kit from rhydoLABZ
sensors (light, sound, bump, distance,
etc) and mechanical parts like links,
wheels and gears. It can be used to create
different intelligent machines, be it
an obstacle avoider, automatic crane or
garbage collector.
The mechanical structure of the kit
acts as a chassis or body of the robot.
The electronic controller board controls
all the electromechanical parts
and inherits the logic part of the robot.
Sensors/actuators and other interface
devices help the robot to connect to the
world, by sensing it and then taking
action as a response to the stimulus.
Sensors use transducers to change the
input signal (sound, light, pressure,
temperature, etc) into an analogue or
digital form capable of being used by
the robot.
A variety of electric motors provide
power to robots, allowing them to
move material, parts, tools or special-
ised devices with various programmed
motions.
generally, two types of batteries
are used to provide power supply: Primary
batteries are used once and then
discarded. Secondary batteries operate
from a (mostly) reversible chemical
reaction and can be recharged several
times.
Software tools come with application
software to configure, sequence
and also develop and download algorithms
into the robot. High-end
software tools
do simulation
and 3D visualisation
to assist the entire robot
development life-cycle.
Microcontrollers (MCUs) are
intelligent electronic devices used
inside robots. A microcontroller takes
input from the device and controls it by
sending signals to different components
Many vendors
are selling
cheap,
unbranded
robotic items.
Many Chinese items have
also come into the market.
These vendors have no
knowledge of robotics. —Ajit
Vira, general manager, MacNet Technology
in the device. Robotic kits use various
platforms such as 8051, AVR and even
32-bit ARM processor. These perform
various functions ranging from path
planning, vision-based processing to
Swarm behavioural functions. For programming,
generally, any ‘C’ compiler
Most of the kits that contain microcontrollers
can be interfaced with PCs, Ethernet modules,
Zigbee wireless modules, sensors, etc. —Sandeep
Vaidya, R&D head, Robokits India
is preferred.
The LEgO Mindstorms platform
comes with the LEgO plug-and-play
guarantee. LEgO parts are used for the
assembly and creation of robots. The
LEgO controller is an ARM-based controller
that can be programmed using a
USB or a Bluetooth connection. Many
different kinds of environments are
available for programming, including
LabView, C, C++ and Java. Support
Components of a
standard kit
1. Programmable platform (the logic
processor of the bot)
2. Motors (actuators to move the bot)
3. Sensors (to gather information
about surroundings)
4. Power supply
5. PC interface kit (to enable
programming of the bot via PC)
86 • July 2010 • electronics for you www.efymag.com

Make sure that
the kits are
expandable
so that you
can keep
developing
more and more complex
projects. —Adwait Deshpande, R&D
Head, Robotics Division, ThinkLABS, Sine
IIT Mumbai
for Microsoft Robotic Studio is also
available.
Functions depend on the type of
the kit:
• Wheeled robots: Remote control,
sensor inputs, line following, motor
encoders, LCD, switches, etc
• Walking robots: Motion sequencing,
balancing, etc
• UAVs and fully autonomous outdoor
robots: gPS navigation and
long-distance communications
The modularity of the hardware
and user-friendliness of the software
encourage users to try out more and
more complex contraptions.
Most of the robotic kits are USBcompatible
for reprogramming. Hardware
structure of certain models can
be assembled in multiple ways, so you
can construct different robots using the
same parts.
Robotic kits are available in a
ThinkLABS’ iBot microcontroller-based autonomous robotic
development platform
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Style
Fire Bird V ATMEGA2560 hexapod
from NEx Robotics
compact form and are easy to interconnect.
There will be specification and
directions for each and every part, so
little effort is required to develop an
amazing robot. gUI-based programming
software that come along with
the kit let you develop a robotic application
by means of the mouse pointer
(requiring only clicks and drags). Usually,
robotic kits come with shaped
parts of the robots having specific part
numbers and associated motors, along
with the motor holder. The kit consists
of separate packets of assembly
tools and instructions.
Software support
makes the assembly easy.
User manual illustrates
assembly step by step
with figures. Certain robots
need pre-correction
of the motors and there
are software tools to do
this job.
Functionalities
in demand
Basic functionalities like
sensor interfacing, motor
Buyers’
Guide
driving, servo driving and
wireless command are in
demand. Most buyers in India,
at present, show interest
in line-following or
maze-solving robots.
These robots
need reconfigurable
maze-solving algorithm.
The robot program consists of
different algorithms and the
user can easily reconfigure the
path using the interfacing
software. gUIs developed
in ROSSUM, XRCL or .NET
with the help of compiler (for micro
programming) is used to develop this
interface.
There is a high demand for modular
robotic kits. A modular robotic
kit is a programmable bot that can
be interfaced to different motors and
The level of difficulty is increasing
from doing just line-following
and obstacle-avoiding. —(L) Fahad
Azad, Co-founder, Robosoft Systems, and (R)
Syed Ross Farooq, Founder, Robosoft Systems
sensors. It is generally, but not necessarily,
a two-wheeled robot with
facilities of multiple sensor interface,
wireless communication and PC
interface.
level of autonomy
The robots now developed in India
use different sensors (such as proximity
sensors and polarisation sensors)
to maintain the balance of the robot
and give direction to its path. Balancing
is an amazing process and hence
most companies are focused on this
function. Various input applications
like voice processing, image processing
and multiple sensor reading and
response are already implemented. But
certain materials for manufacturing
specialised robots like wall-climbing
robots are not available in India, and
are very costly to import.
System engineering of industrial
electronics for you • July 2010 • 87

Buyers’
Guide
Global scenario
The number of robots in the world today is approaching 1,000,000, with almost half
that number in Japan and just 15 per cent in the US. A couple of decades ago, 90 per
cent of robots were used in car manufacturing, typically on assembly lines doing a
variety of repetitive tasks. Today, only 50 per cent are in automobile plants, with the
other half spread out among other factories, laboratories, warehouses, energy plants,
hospitals and many other industries. In the area of ‘electronic business,’ industrial
robots are changing too. High competition existing in the global market requires ‘just
in time’ products, better utilisation of raw materials, better utilisation of resources
and lower consumption of energy. All these requirements imply new features for the
industrial robots.
The robotic kits market is primarily centred around recreation, service, and learning
and research.
Recreational robotics is becoming popular with robot competitions like robot soccer.
This is particularly popular in Asian counties like Japan, Korea, Singapore, Taiwan and
China. The current market share in this category is comparatively low now and is likely
to diminish in a decade as robots become more common in our daily life and we lose
excitement in their novelty. Kits in particular will find it difficult to catch this market due
to their limited scope compared to research prototypes in this area.
The future trend is definitely towards service robots, which are semi or fully
autonomous and can provide useful services in support of humans and manufacturing
environments. There will be a substantial increase in activity and build-up of this market.
Here again finished products are expected to dominate kits.
Coming to research and learning, there is a consistently growing market for robots
and robotic kits in this space. As far as product development in this area is concerned,
there is a need for adequate kits and spares to carry out the research and prototyping.
Apart from that, robotic kits serve as a multidisciplinary learning tool for fundamentals
such as mathematics, physics, and science, which again is a promising market. Here
kits undoubtedly dominate any other specifically tailored product.
robots around specific applications
is a crucial area. Lack of the trained
system engineering manpower and reluctance
of the Indian industry to open
to advanced methods of manufacturing
have led to a stunted demand for
industrial robots.
Some of the advanced applications
developed by Indian students
can be seen in national-level competitions
like Micromouse and Robocon.
Maze solving, image processing and
pick-and-place arms are some of the
skills that we are evolving in. The
level of expertise is increasing from
just line-following and obstacleavoiding
to swarm robotic behav-
iour, which requires many robots
to cooperate with each other to do a
particular task.
Trends world over
Basic functionalities like sensor interfacing,
motor driving, servo driving and wireless
command are in demand. —Pulkit Gaur, Founder and
Chief Technology Officer, Gridbots Technologies
global trends also hint that preassembled
robots are gaining more popularity
and people usually use them as
the first building block and develop
applications over them, thus relieving
them from the burden of building
the chassis, finding a drive system and
calibrating the system.
The scenario outside India is different
mainly because people are ready
to go for advanced robots and the
technology and sensors used in them.
Some kits like
Bioloid enable
the user to
configure his
robot in 18
different ways.—Jayakrishnan T.,
Director and Country Manager, Energid
Technologies
They are ready to pay a high price
for the same. Widely used robots are
robotic arms, bipeds, humanoids and
soccer robots.
Competitions are and have always
been an incentive to make robots, be it
in India or Japan. The difference lies in
the level of the competition. Robo Soccer
is a popular competition in which
a team of four robots play a game of
soccer against another team. Flying
robot competition and humanoid robo
fighting championship are some other
popular events.
advances in hardware and
software
The electronic hardware keeps on
advancing, nowadays in the form
of complex sensors, communication
systems and control systems. These
technologies are definitely used in
India but on a very small scale compared
to other countries. However, a
technology that is available in USA
today can be made available in India
tomorrow, thanks to global shopping
sites like sparkfun.com and digikey.
com.
Application-wise, we are overcoming
the not-so-huge gap between us
and other advanced nations.
A lot is happening in software
development of the robotics. With the
software available with robotic kits,
the end user need not study the basics
of microcontroller programming. He
only needs to have a certain logical
skill like what to do and what should
be the end result.
88 • July 2010 • electronics for you www.efymag.com

emphasis of
design
As in any other product,
design plays a pivotal
role in the success of robotic
kits. The design is
dependent on the target
group. Kids want their
kits to be colourful, easy
to use and robust. Engineering
students want
the circuits to be open,
the kit to be modular and
facilities of add-on modules,
whereas lab equip-
ment should be robust and critical and
circuits should be closed and secured.
The other design considerations are
design efficiency, economy, material/
component availability, optimising
manufacturing process, etc. If the design
is targeted for Indian customers,
the emphasis is on value for money.
For international clients, the emphasis
is on kits that solve complex problems.
Cost of the robot can be reduced
by changing the materials used in construction
of body parts. Manufacturers
study the end product and select the
actuators and sensors that are best
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Style
Cyton I robot manipulator from Energid Technologies
Hardware structure of certain models can be
assembled in multiple ways, so that you can
construct different robots using the same
parts. —Thushar V. Nadh, Director-Technical, Rhydo Technologies
sleuthHound automatic
locking and tracking camera
system from Gridbots
suited for the robot. For example, certain
robots need precision rather than
speed. In that case, a stepper motor is
used instead of servo or brushless DC
motors.
Cost has a direct relationship with
quantity. In India, the demand in this
segment is very low compared to other
countries and hence the costs are quite
high. However, with an increase in
awareness and hence demand, prices
of robotic kits will fall.
To make the kits appealing to the
Indian consumers, manufacturers need
to come up with different kinds of
Buyers’
Guide
electronics for you • July 2010 • 89

Buyers’
Guide
When
purchasing a
kit, make sure
that it is at the
right difficulty
level for you. Also consider
the number of sensors and
number of building blocks
in the kit.—Sachitanand Malewar,
Director, NEX Robotics
package deals. For example, instead of
offering a bot with ten different kinds
of sensors, they could offer a bot with
four sensors and the rest six can be
bought individually as add-ons.
Displays, chips, networking, etc.
Many of these kits use the technology
that is currently being used in industries.
Robotic kits for engineering students,
in particular, are equipped with
ultrasonic/infrared sensors, LCDs, latest
microcontrollers, etc. Some of these
technologies don’t even find a mention
in the current academic syllabus.
So the students are exposed to such
devices and concepts through robotics
and their personal projects.
Most of the kits that use microcontrollers
can be interfaced with PCs,
Ethernet modules, Zigbee wireless
modules, sensors, etc.
Why is robotics not much
popular in india?
In countries like USA, Japan and
Korea, most of the high-paying jobs
are from high-tech R&D sectors and
require constant innovation. As a
developed country, there is a good
emphasis on high-quality vocational
training and universities have talented
vocational teachers. Children
are exposed to high-tech toys at a
very young age. Students work overtime
and use self-earned money for
the hobby robotics, because of which
they have bigger budget for their
robotics projects.
In India, we are experiencing all
these things for the first time. Most of
the critical electrical and mechanical
components and systems, including
harmonic drives, servo valves and
cylinders, servo motors, controllers,
encoders and position resolvers, are
currently being imported, making the
final product extremely expensive.
Also, Indians feel alienated by the
idea of robots replacing human labour.
It does make sense that in an abundantly
populated country like ours,
robotics will not be preferred. But now
people have started to understand the
other uses of robots where humans
need not be replaced. Fields like space
exploration and defence can flourish
with the use of robotics.
advice to consumers
All the robotics sets have instructions
on how to build some basic robots.
The keyword here is ‘build,’ because
you will be building them. So make
The LEGO Mindstorms NXT is based on the
ARM processors. All sensors are I 2 C-compliant
and motors are geared servo motors with
built-in PID controllers.—Sudhanshu Sharma, managing
director, Techtronics Education
sure that this is what you want. When
purchasing a kit, make sure that it is
at the right difficulty level for you.
Also consider the number of sensors
and number of building blocks in the
kit.
Specifications play a very important
role. Make sure you have the
right specifications before you order
online (or offline). In particular, pay
attention to following features of the
kit: Programmability and ease of use,
number of sensors and type of sensors
used, type of batteries and motors
used, applications and functionalities
of the robot, number of degrees of
freedom in case of robotic arms and
walking robots, communication systems
and cost.
Look at the safety features too.
Many a times, robotic kits are sold with
lots of claims that are not true. Robots
often have insufficient battery power;
the battery becomes unusable after a
few days of use. So avoid buying kits
that use low-cost lithium-ion/NiMH
batteries from grey market. These may
not have proper battery protection and
come with low-cost battery chargers.
In such cases, it is very likely that the
battery will explode and cause serious
injuries after a few charge-discharge
cycles. Transistorised motor drivers too
can blow if not handled properly. Buy
gear motors, which have black gear
box and are more reliable.
Look for scalability in terms of addons.
Buy a kit that is multifunctional,
expandable and reprogrammable so
that you can keep developing more
and more complex projects. For example,
a simple line-follower robot kit
or mobile-operated robot kit will be
nothing but a toy after some time of
usage. A microcontroller-based robot
kit or a programmable walking robot
kit, on the other hand, will give good
knowledge, offer continuous entertainment
and learning, and can be used in
making more advanced robots.
Ensure that the kit comes with a
well-documented manual or a training
programme.
An ideal hobby kit would be a microcontroller
development board with
schematic, standard sensors, reliable
wireless modules, DC motors with encoders
and a USB interface. The development
board helps to interface many
different kinds of peripherals that you
can develop yourself. �
The author is a deputy editor at EFY
90 • July 2010 • electronics for you www.efymag.com