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JPL Open Source Rover Project

by kscottz on 9/22/23, 7:23 PM with 32 comments

  • by throwaway892238 on 9/23/23, 2:47 AM

    Dumb question, kind of unrelated: In the process of building a remote controlled cart to haul small heavy loads offroad. Have no experience in engineering or robotics. Where could one go to learn what's needed, say, starting at the motor/drivetrain? (ex: what kind of motor to use, exterior or interior gearing, how to calculate motor size/voltage/gearing needed to haul X weight up Y gradient, steering geometry, actuators for remote steering, etc)
  • by dang on 9/23/23, 12:31 AM

    Related:

    JPL Open-Source Rover Project Based on the Rovers on Mars - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17676730 - Aug 2018 (67 comments)

  • by mdorazio on 9/23/23, 1:25 AM

    Interesting that they went with the top-mounted differential version rather than the central gearbox version. I'm guessing it's cheaper. The rockers are also a lot more angular than the real mars rovers to save on needing to bend struts. Very interesting trade-offs to make this buildable with off-the-shelf parts, but I personally like the 3D printable iterations of the same concept ex. [1].

    [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=90HxqwZaWRA

  • by pryelluw on 9/22/23, 10:52 PM

    Nice, I contributed to the software for this a while back. Wanted to really get into building my own robot by following the linked resource. Covid happened. Maybe someday.

    Anyone here built it?

  • by bmitc on 9/23/23, 8:07 AM

    Has anyone tackled this or adapted it?

    I wonder if it would make for a fun summer or semester project to assign teams to various subsystems.

  • by m3kw9 on 9/22/23, 11:10 PM

    I’m thinking someone could make this run in 3d graphics saving me a few $$
  • by SillyUsername on 9/23/23, 8:58 AM

    BOM > $1000. Bit too rich for my taste. :/
  • by sam_bristow on 9/22/23, 11:30 PM

    The licencing isn't as clear as I'd like. LICENSE.txt says it's Apache 2.0 but DISCLAIMER.txt says you need explocit permission to do anything commercial.