Students from Crabapple Crossing elementary school have used the Snatcher for their “Robotic Recycling Center”. They’ve added a color sensor to be able to track lines, too. It’s always nice to see adaptions from the standard design to add more functionality. Well done kids! If you’ve done something special with the Snatcher, let me know...

This is what I like about the Mindstorms community. It’s also why I publish building instructions for my robots. Beginning users will enjoy the printer as an advanced project, but advanced users like Daniele Benedettelli, take the existing design to the next level. Danny wrote a Java program to enable the printer to draw not...

If you’ve ever wondered why there isn’t a baseplate for Technic structures, you’re not alone. They’re useful especially for stationary robots, including but not limited to brick sorters or scientific set ups. Two Danes (of course) came up with the idea to design and manufacture such Technic Baseplate. Their project, Minute Bot Base, is currently...

The thirteenth issue of HispaBrick Magazine is out! HispaBrick (In English and Spanish) is a fan-made LEGO magazine with articles on all things LEGO. It frequently features MINDSTORMS and TECHNIC related topics and it’s no different this time. You’ll find coverage of several MINDSTORMS events, including the Mobile World Congress (So many Snatcher‘s!), and an...

Flying is fun, but if you can’t fly, you jump. The NXT is a bit on the heavy side, though. If you know of a jumping NXT bot, share in the comments! Find more info here, and and the Boston Dynamics webpage.

One of my readers told me about a new WiFi NXT sensor crowd funding project by Daniele Benedettelli. Below you can see a video, but here’s what it does in short: “NXT2WIFI is a miniature web server module featuring a fully integrated 802.11 b/g/n Wi-Fi interface, giving your LEGO® MINDSTORMS® creations access to any Wi-Fi...

Mike Brandl posted a video of his flying LEGO contraption (see more info here). Pretty cool! And for those who haven’t seen it yet, here’s the NXT blimp by Kenneth Madsen and Lasse Lauesen. As I write this, I’m in the midst of a Fluid Mechanics course. Perhaps by the end of the course I’ll...

I haven’t been to a lot of FTC competitions, but this one was held in Delft, just about 500m from my apartment. So I went there to take some pictures and shoot some video. I’ve got to admit that the Tetrix system looks quite cool, but it’s pretty expensive. The competition was okay, though it...

LEGO has lot of cool helicopters on offer, but none of them quite fly. Dexter Industries is trying to change that — by making a LEGO quadcopter. Only two of the four rotors are working now, but it’s a cool first step. Here’s a video.

From the Mindsensors page: This sensor measures pressures produced by LEGO Pneumatics systems and lot more. The pressure range of this sensor is from 0 to 58 PSI. The sensor measures absolute pressure as well as relative pressure. (You can set reference pressure, and measure change in pressure relative to that reference). This is a...