Bao Lee Hnetinka

Hello, friends my name is Bao Lee Hnetinka. I am living in Hong Kong city. My title says:LeeHnetinka is robotic engineer graduated from Hong Kong College of technology, but I say: God. My hobbies include playing video games, reading and assembling things. From my childhood, I have a keen interest in collecting metal self-assembly toys.

The Lee Hnetinka blog is all about getting knowledge and sharing it. I'm not a writer, that doesn't make my opinion dishonest. I’ve dedicated my life to robotics and love to spend time in learning new things about robots. According to chénmò, shìjīn; However good you are there is always someone better. As there are many excellent people spreading around the world, it seems hard for you to be always the best one. Don’t be frustrated. What you should do is to learn from the people who are better than you. Work harder and better your best.

Lee Hnetinka vision is to be able to fight on the NASA EARLY Robotics Competition. If you are using robotics then you must be aware that Legos are not just for kids, on robotics we use them all the time. I’m excellent at programming, assembling robots parts. Working on Robotics has been my passion since my early age of life.

Lee Hnetinka grew up assembling LEGO and NINJAGO structures, incorporating them up with Hot Wheels motors. I’m building the best robot with features that no one saw till yet. My family is supporting me always in my dreams.

I’m a member of the HKCT Robo Team and we are building a complete Football team, it’s going to be wonderful. Last year’s VEXT Robotics Competition was the most excellent incident of my life. If you are curious about my work and want to know more about my work stay connected.

Bao Lee Hnetinka- a robotic engineer

Hello, everyone, my name is  Bao Lee Hnetinka. My friends and near ones call me Lee Hnetinka.  I am China-born and presently living in Hong Kong. Currently, my address in Hong Kong, Tsing Yi, 青衣城1301A. Lee Hnetinka is 40 years old and he has a vast knowledge of technology. So you can get great ideas from Lee. I love playing video games, reading books related to technology.

From last few years, I am collecting metal self-assembly toys. I plane to start blogging because consider this is the right medium to transfer thoughts and ideas and get new viewpoints of people. Lee Hnetinka has dedicated its life to robotics. Last year’s VEXT Robotics Competition was the most excellent experience of my life.

Lee Hnetinka is good at programming, assembling robots has been my zeal since I can remember. I grew up assembling LEGO and NINJAGO structures, mixing them up with Hot Wheels motors. Lee Hnetinka dream is to be able to compete on the NASA Early Robotics Competition so I’m building the best robot with features that no one has ever seen. I’m a division of the HKCT RoboTeam and soon building an entire Football team, It’s going to be amazing. My friends believe that I will become the CEO Of the company soon.

Being a programmer I understand technology very well and thus read new technology updates on regular basis to keep myself updated. Lee Hnetinka dream is to be able to compete on the NASA EARLY Robotics Competition. Lee will share all the ideas and ideologies with all the people and you can connect with me on all social media platforms valley wag, twitter, facebook etc. I think we are privileged to live in times where everyone is so connected. Once you will connect with Lee you will get interesting topics to discover. But for the timing stay tuned I will come back soon with some interesting facts.

How to Make a Robot – Lesson 1: Getting Started

Knowledge & Learning

In order to build increasingly complex robots, most professionals and hobbyists use knowledge they have acquired when building previous robots. Instead of building one robot, you can learn how to use individual components with the objective of building your own “knowledge library” to use to undertake a larger, more complex design in the future.

Amusement & Companionship

Building a robot is in and of itself is fun and exciting. Robotics incorporates aspects of many disciplines including engineering (mechanical, electrical, computer), sciences (mathematics and physics) and arts (aesthetics) and users are free to use their imagination. Amusing others with your creations (especially if they are user-friendly and interactive) helps others to become interested in the field.

Competitions & Contests

Competitions give the project design guidelines and a due date. They also put your robot against others in the same class and test your design and construction skills. Although many competitions are specifically for students (elementary to university), there also exist open competitions where adults and professionals alike can compete.

Autonomous life form

Humans are natural creators and innovators. The next great innovation will be to develop a fully autonomous life form that rivals or surpasses ourselves in ability and perhaps creativity. This goal is still being accomplished in small steps by individuals, research organizations and professionals.

Domestic or Professional tasks

Domestic robots help liberate people from unpleasant or dangerous tasks and give them more liberty and security. Professional and Service Robots are used in a variety of applications at work, in public, in hazardous environments, in locations such as deep-sea, battlefields and space, just to name a few. In addition to the service areas such as cleaning, surveillance, inspection and maintenance, we utilize these robots where manual task execution is dangerous, impossible or unacceptable.  Professional and Service Robots are more capable, rugged and often more expensive than domestic robots and are ideally suited for professional and/or commercial use.

Security and Surveillance

Most mobile robots are used to venture into areas where humans either should not or cannot go. Robots of various sizes (either remote controlled, semi-autonomous or fully autonomous) are an ideal choice for these tasks.

Practical Example

We anticipate that most of you following this guide have the objective of building a robot for learning and knowledge, but also for sheer fun; though many will have a specific idea or project they want to materialize.

The last major consideration is budget. It is difficult to know exactly what people have in mind when they build their first robot; one might already want to build an autonomous snow removal robot, while another simply wants to make an intelligent clock. A simple programmable mobile robot might cost about $100 while a more complex can be several thousands of dollars.

In this exercise, we have chosen to make a mobile platform in order to get an understanding of motors, sensors, microcontrollers and programming, and to include a variety of sensors. We’ll keep the budget to about $200 to $300 since we want it to be fairly complete.

Text extracted from: http://www.robotshop.com/blog/en/how-to-make-a-robot-lesson-1-3707

Repairing and Improving Robots

I’ve built quite a few robots over the years. Some of the robots have broken and a few were never quite tweaked to full operational capability. I decided to spend a weekend inspecting my robots; making any minor repairs or improvements as necessary.

Like all robot builders, when I look at a robot that I made several years ago (or sometimes several hours ago), I see a lot of mistakes and room for improvement. I could spend months rebuilding and retrofitting many of my earlier designs. It took every ounce of self-control to avoid the perfection trap. I vowed not to replace whole boards or redesign whole body parts. Instead, I focused on repairs (glue, solder, paint, filing, drilling) and part replacements (screws, capacitors, diodes, motors) only to the extent necessary to get the robot in good working condition again.

Sweet

Sweet is a line-following robot featured at Robot Room.

At the rear of the robot, a pushbutton switch sticks out as the robot’s tailpipe. Pushing the tailpipe switch causes the robot to begin following the line course.

At the time Sweet was built, I used hot-melt glue to secure the switch in place. I’ve tried using hot-melt glue on several occasions and every time I’ve been disappointed with the results. Hot-melt glue is messy to apply. It also has a tendency to peel off of non-porous surfaces, such as plastics and metals -- which is exactly what happened in this case.

It’s unfair to blame hot-melt glue in this particular case since Sweet is made from a candy container with a slick inside. I mean, the very purpose of the inside of this container is to prevent food from sticking to it. Nearly any type of adhesive, from tape to epoxy, will fail to adhere.

A mechanical fastener, such as a bolt, is a better choice to hold the switch in place.

I had to make a decision as to whether to remove the hot-melt glue from the switch and to glue the switch to a piece of machined plastic or metal that could be more easily attached with screws. (A good example of this technique appears on Figure 16-17 of Intermediate Robot Building.)

Well, I took the lazy route and decided to simply drill two holes through the metal container and the hot-melt glue. That was a mistake! If you’ve every drilled through plastic, you’ve probably accidentally melted plastic chips (debris) into the flutes (channels) of the drill by drilling too fast. (Drilling plastic at too fast of an RPM results in significant amounts of friction-induced heat, causing the plastic to melt rather than cut.)

Hot-melt glue is actually just thermoplastic engineered to melt at a lower temperature. So guess what happens when you try to drill through hot-melt glue? It melts.

I quickly gummed up one of my nicer drill bits -- even at what I thought was a reasonably slow speed. After picking out as much of the glue as possible from drill flutes, I was able to get the rest out by drilling through a block of scrap wood. Even so, I am suspicious that the drill retains some hot-melt glue at a microscopic level or in some unseen crevice.

Believe it or not, I chose a #43 drill for #4-40 screws. That means I originally intended to tap those holes in the hot-melt glue. I suspected all along that the soft glue wouldn’t hold screw threads, but I figured it was worth a try. But, after the experience with the drill, I wasn’t about to insert my fancy expensive tap into the hot-melt glue. Before giving up and ripping all of the hot-melt glue off of the switch, I decided to try inserting screws without tapping.

It worked! Okay, I admit it doesn’t look very professional.

The machine screws are held securely in the hot-melt glue. In fact, you can see in the picture above that the mere act of screwing in the screws seems to have melted or otherwise adhered hot-melt glue into the screw threads. No nuts are necessary. Actually, I can’t seem to get any nuts to go onto the screws because the hot-glue has gummed up the threads.

The switch is now firmly in place and Sweet is ready to roll again!

Text extracted from: http://www.robotroom.com/Repairs.html

Robots learn to evolve and improve

Engineers have developed a robotic system that can evolve and improve its performance.

A robot arm builds "babies" that get progressively better at moving without any human intervention.The ultimate aim of the research project is to develop robots that adapt to their surroundings.The work by teams in Cambridge and Zurich has been published in the journal PLOS One.It seems like a plot from a science fiction film: a robot that builds other robots - each one better than the previous generation. But that is what researchers in Cambridge and Zurich have done.

But those concerned about machines taking over the world shouldn't worry, at least not yet.At this stage the "baby robots" consist of plastic cubes with a motor inside. These are put together by a "mother" robot arm which glues them together in different configurations.Although the set up is simple the system itself is ingenious.

The mother robot assesses how far its babies are able to move, and with no human intervention, improves the design so that the next one it builds can move further.

The mother robot built ten generations of children. The final version moved twice the distance of the first before its power ran out.

According to Dr Fumiya Iida of Cambridge University, who led the research with colleagues at ETH Zurich, one aim is to gain new insights into how living things evolve.

"One of the big questions in biology is how intelligence came about - we're using robotics to explore this mystery," he told BBC News.

"We think of robots as performing repetitive tasks, and they're typically designed for mass production instead of mass customisation, but we want to see robots that are capable of innovation and creativity."

Another aim is to develop robots that can improve and adapt to new situations, according to Andre Rosendo - who also worked on the project.

"You can imagine cars being built in factories and the robot looking for defects in the car and fixing them by itself," he said.

"And robots used in agriculture could try out slightly different ways of harvesting crops to see if they can improve yield."

DrIidya told me that he came into robotics because he was disappointed that the robots he saw in real life were not as good as the ones he saw in science fiction films such as Star Wars and Star Trek.

His aim was to change that and his approach was to draw lessons from the natural world to improve the efficiency and flexibility of traditional robotic systems.

As to whether we'd ever see robots like those in the sci-fi films that inspired him, he said: "We're not there yet, but sure, why not, maybe in about 30 years."

Text extracted from: http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-33867941

14 Robotics Breakthroughs From the Past Decade

Robots — is there anything we're more fascinated by and terrified of at the same time?

Everyone knows that robots are cool, but the technology has also come a long way from their humble beginnings. We've bought robots as toys, sent them into space and let them into our bodies — and this is only the beginning.

The robotics world is far too vast and fast-growing for this to be a comprehensive list, but these are some of the most notable developments in robotics since 2000.

2000: Run, ASIMO, Run

Honda has worked on an interactive, walking robot since 1986, aiming to improve our quality of life. The company started with legs, and improved its models over time.

In October 2000, Honda debuted the famous ASIMO robot — Advanced Step in Innovative Mobility — the first one designed both to function in a human environment and also to incorporate predicted movement control (hence, a more natural walking movement). The four-foot, three-inch tall robot’s claim to fame was its advanced technology (i.e., hip joints) that allowed it to walk smoothly and climb stairs.

With newer versions released in 2002, 2005, 2007 and 2011, the most recent ASIMO not only walks, runs and turns, but it can also navigate uneven surfaces, climb stairs, reach for and grasp objects, recognize faces, map its environment, and avoid obstacles.

2001: PackBots and Sept. 11

After the Sept. 11 attacks, the collapsed buildings and landscape were too enclosed and dangerous for humans or dogs to navigate.

Remote-controlled, shoebox-sized PackBots, manufactured by iRobot, became known for being the first robots used in response to a disaster. They went where no robot had gone before: determining the structural integrity of damaged buildings, taking images and searching through rubble for survivors.

Like ASIMO, PackBots have continued to be updated and have been used in various difficult instances.

2002: Roomba, the Domestic Robot

The first truly popular domestic robot, iRobot’s Roomba let every family pretend it lived alongside the space-age Jetsons. The cordless silver disk weighed just seven pounds and provided real utility for only $199. It zoomed around the room and vacuumed your floors, all without instruction.

The Roomba turned 10 last year, and is arguably the first robot to enjoy such a degree of commercial success, to the tune of 8 million units sold.

Text extracted from: http://mashable.com/2013/10/23/robotics-breakthroughs/#pzbDK84LPaq1

Improved Robot Technology

In the 1960s, scientists began to develop the robotic technology that we see today in factories all over the world. By the 1980s, manufacturers began flocking to integrators to buy robotic systems specially designed for their production lines. Over the last five decades, robot improvements have stretched the limits, moving from the factory to the service industry and beyond.

Did you know that there are robots that work in the medical field as doctors, surgeons and even pharmacists? Robot improvements have converted robots to interactive doctors that can draw blood and perform checkups. These robots have a television on them, where the doctor can see the patient and vice versa, and they can interact with them from anywhere in the world. In theory, if this robotic technology continued to improve, doctors could once again begin making house calls from the comfort of their offices – making it more convenient for doctor and patient.

However, robots that work in the outside world are not the only ones that have been improved. With the introduction of vision cameras and touch and motion sensors, new robots are able to work and interact with humans in a way that they never were before. Instead of being enclosed in a cage, these new industrial robots can work on a line in coordination with other human workers. Motion sensors allow the robot to sense when someone is near them, so they can slow or stop their motion, making them less dangerous to their human counterparts.

Would you like to learn more about the improvements to robotic technology that could enhance the quality of your production line? If so, you should give RobotWorx a call. RobotWorx is a certified integrator for several different robotics companies, including ABB, KUKA, Motoman and FANUC. Our staff will work with you to help you build the perfect robotic system for your facility and budget.

For more information, contact RobotWorx today at 740-251-4312.

Text extracted from:https://www.robots.com/articles/viewing/improved-robot-technology

Bao Lee Hnetinka

I’m good at programming, assembling robots has been my passion since I can remember. I grew up assembling LEGO and NINJAGO structures, mixing them up with Hot Wheels motors. My dream is to be able to compete on the NASA Early Robotics Competition so I’m building the best robot with features that no one has ever seen. I’m a part of the HKCT RoboTeam and we are building an entire Football team, It’s going to be amazing.