Hummingbird Tips and Tricks

[John Baglio]

Hi,

I am in the midst of a (first time) Hummingbird "Robotic Zoo" unit with my 7th and 8th graders.  I love the platform so far and have successfully been using it with ChromeBooks.  The scratch X extension works well and I am having kids store their code in their GDrives.  Angi Chau has a great tutorial handout that I have been using as a reference but I have a bunch of other questions.

•  What is the degree range of the servos?  They seem to have a bit of a mind of their own.

•  Is there a way to calibrate the distance sensors?  I have had ones that work well and others that don't seem to work accurately at all.  

•  Does anyone have good websites or other resources that can help students build mechanisms to go with the humminbird and cardboard?  I am specifically thinking of how to change the rotational motion to up and down motion simply.  I have looked to automata websites for this but think there is even a simpler way to do it.

I would love to know of anyone else has any best practices using the Hummingbird platform.  Do's, Don'ts etc.

Thanks!!

John

John Baglio

Engineering and CS teacher/Green Roof Coordinator

Fieldston Middle School

Bronx, NY

[Ariel Kitch]

Hi John,

Here's a link to a YouTube playlist I've compiled that I show students when I begin our Hummingbird unit (big caveat: these are not my students, just a compilation of videos I like):

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLhqHH-WFejIfEGNJW20hqmJ0WQkvLpV4h

Karen Polstra, in particular (perhaps she's out there?) has inspired me so much by filming her students' projects.

One thing we do on our Macs is to check the "Prevent App Nap" box under "Get Info"- that helped our sensors to work properly.  I don't know what the equivalent is on a Chromebook, but I wonder if there is a setting you need to change to make sure the sensors continue to pick up information?

We have printed out a bunch of motor attachments to make it easier for students to attach other parts to the motors. A list of different 3-D hummingbird parts that they have designed is available here: http://www.hummingbirdkit.com/learning/3d-printing-and-hummingbird

The rotational range of the servos is 180 - this gets programmed different ways depending on your software, however.

Hope some of this information helps!

Best,

Ariel

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Ariel Kitch

Middle School Technology Integrator

Friends Seminary

222 E. 16th St 

New York, NY 10003

                 

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[John Baglio]

Yes!  Thanks so much.  I also found that I wanted to attach things to the gear motors other than the HB wheels they send out.  Specificly, I created a small hub that friction fits with the gear motor shaft and has a surface for gluing cardboard or paper parts on the other end.  You can find the .obj file for that part here

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John Baglio

Engineering Teacher and Green Roof Coordinator

Fieldston Middle School

(718) 329-7300 ext. 3383

Website: http://bit.ly/mrbaglio

[Rob Morrill]

Hi John,

I have been designing stands, arms, and a spool for Hummingbird servos and motors, and I also designed a protective tray that the boards can be zip-tied into. 

Servo mechanism: http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:1863753

Board tray: http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:1850196

Motor spool: http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:1851467

Servo stand: http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:1856918

Like you, I'm new to Hummingbirds. I think they are great, and my 8th graders are learning and having fun. 

Cheers,

Rob

[John Baglio]

Fascinating!  I really like the board holders.  I think they may increase the longevity of Duo.  Your 3D printed servo arms remind me of tongue depressors, of which I have a lot and may use in the meantime...

Thanks,

John

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John Baglio

Engineering Teacher and Green Roof Coordinator

Fieldston Middle School

[John Baglio]

I have a few more advanced kids and I wonder if anyone has done anything with H-Bird + Arduino/Python using Chromebooks.  We are a chromebook school and I think some of the advanced kids might like the challenge of programming the H-bird in a text-based language so they can then untether the H-bird.  Do you know how to do that?

Thanks,

John

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Ariel Kitch

Middle School Technology Integrator

Friends Seminary

222 E. 16th St 

New York, NY 10003

                 

[Marcia Gauvin]

John - I am a STEM teacher at a k-6 school, and we are also a 1:1 chrome book school.  We just purchased some Hummingbirds class kits and the kids (5th and 6th) love them!  We run them on Scratch/Snap, and the coding is super easy - especially when kids already have experience with Scratch.  I look forward to doing more and more with them.