Student Robotics

Student Robotics challenges teams of 16 to 18 year-olds to design, build and develop autonomous robots to compete in their annual competition. After announcing the year’s game, they give teams six months to engineer their creations. They mentor teams throughout this time, as well as supply them with a kit which provides a framework they can build their robot around.

Student Robotics is currently on it’s fourth generation of robotics kit, which is mostly based around the ODROID U3 and some custom designed hardware that’s based on STM32 microcontrollers. The kit communicates with the ODROID using USB, which has proven to be a more reliable communication method than their previous kits.

Student Robotics KCH v1

Support Level

Core

Bus

Raspberry Pi GPIO and I2C via Kernel

Board Class

j5.boards.sr.KCHBoard

The KCH v1 is a Raspberry Pi HAT designed for the Student Robotics Kit.

The following components are available:

  • board.leds - A dictionary of RGB LEDs corresponding to the three user controllable LEDs and the start LED.

Student Robotics Power Board v4

Support Level

Core

Bus

USB

Board Class

j5.boards.sr.v4.PowerBoard

Console Backend

j5.backends.console.sr.v4.SRV4PowerBoardConsoleBackend

Hardware Backend

j5.backends.hardware.sr.v4.SRV4PowerBoardHardwareBackend

The Power Board v4 is a board used for managing power in a Student Robotics Kit, and is powered by a LiPo battery.

The following components are available:

The following components also exist, but are not intended for use by competitors:

  • board._error_led - The red “error” LED

  • board._run_led - The green “run” LED

Two firmware generations are available for this board, known as the legacy (version 3) and serial (version 4+) firmwares. Both generations are supported by the backend implementation, which will automatically determine the correct underlying backend to use during the board discovery phase.

Power Board Power Outputs

There are eight total power outputs on the Power Board, 2 high current, 4 low current and 2 5V outputs. The 5V outputs are wired in parallel from the same regulator.

Note

The 5V Regulator is only controllable from board running version 4 “serial” firmware. Additionally, the L2 port is not controllable in version 4 firmware.

class j5.boards.sr.v4.PowerOutputPosition(value)[source]

A mapping of name to number of the PowerBoard outputs.

The numbers here are the same as used in wire communication with the PowerBoard.

FIVE_VOLT = 6
H0 = 0
H1 = 1
L0 = 2
L1 = 3
L2 = 4
L3 = 5

Student Robotics Motor Board v4

Support Level

Core

Bus

USB

Board Class

j5.boards.sr.v4.MotorBoard

Console Backend

j5.backends.console.sr.v4.SRV4MotorBoardConsoleBackend

Hardware Backend

j5.backends.hardware.sr.v4.SRV4MotorBoardHardwareBackend

The Motor Board v4 is a board used for controlling up to two motors.

The following components are available:

  • board.motors - A list of motors corresponding to the motor outputs.

Student Robotics Servo Board v4

Support Level

Core

Bus

USB

Board Class

j5.boards.sr.v4.ServoBoard

Console Backend

j5.backends.console.sr.v4.SRV4ServoBoardConsoleBackend

Hardware Backend

j5.backends.hardware.sr.v4.SRV4ServoBoardHardwareBackend

The Servo Board v4 is a board used for controlling up to twelve servo motors.

The following components are available:

  • board.servos - A list of servos corresponding to the servo outputs.

Student Robotics Ruggeduino Firmware

Support Level

Core

Bus

USB

Board Class

j5.boards.sr.v4.Ruggeduino

Console Backend

j5.backends.console.sr.v4.SRV4RuggeduinoConsoleBackend

Hardware Backend

j5.backends.hardware.sr.v4.SRV4RuggeduinoHardwareBackend

The Ruggeduino is a robust microcontroller for IO based on the Arduino Uno.

Student Robotics provides firmware that allows basic control of the Ruggeduino over serial.

The following components are available: