Important news about HackSpace

We have some important news to share about HackSpace: Issue 81 was the last issue of HackSpace as a standalone magazine, and HackSpace has become part of The MagPi, the official Raspberry Pi magazine. Starting with issue 145, We’ll be adding pages to The MagPi to make room for the stories and tutorials you’ve come to expect from HackSpace.

Ball Balancer

By Andrew Gregory. Posted

This robot is able to balance a ball on its flat surface. The designer, Johan Link, is an 18-year-old Swiss maker, self-taught on electronics and programming. "When I started learning how to use OpenCV, I wanted to put my knowledge into practice, that’s how I started this project," says Johan.

"Three servo motors are used to tilt the plate to compensate the motions of the ball. A USB camera is perched above the platform, and a Python program analyses the images to detect the ball position, then the computer controls the servos via a custom PCB inside the robot."

"I quickly realised that I was not the only one who had the idea of this kind of robot, that’s why I wanted to stand out by making a robot as elegant as possible."

The build instructions are available at: www.instructables.com/id/Ball-Balancing-PID-System/

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