What happens when you combine IT skills with a passion for cars and LEGO? You can make your own car factory with robot workers.
LEGO is more than a kids’ building game made of plastic bricks. It allows you to enhance your spatial abilities, creative thinking, and problem-solving skills, to name just a few of its benefits. And there’s a lot you can do using LEGO pieces, including a car factory with programmable robots.
Arno van der Vegt recently posted on YouTube a video of a LEGO-powered car factory, which is all motorized and everything. The mini-factory includes five robots, 21 motors, 17 light sensors, and 10 technic hubs. Its creator used programming to bring everything to life and the code was created and executed using the Wheel software.
The five robots in the factory all have their well-defined roles, as explained on Arno van der Vegt’s GitHub’s page. The first robot places a car base on the conveyor belt. A second one places a tan or dark gray seat in the vehicle. Robots four and five are in charge of adding a top on the car (red, brown, green, or blue). The fifth LEGO robot is the “valet” of the factory and is in charge of parking the finished car.
For the robots to be able to perform these tasks, their arms had to be equipped with motors. Their number varies from robot to robot, depending on the role of each machine. The conveyor belts use motors as well. The car factory also uses 17 sensors to calibrate the robots and to detect the position of the vehicles on the conveyor belt.
IT geeks who are into cars and LEGOs can find the source code for the car factory on Arno van der Vegt’s GitHub. It is free to download as a ZIP file.
Cristina’s always found writing more comfortable to do than speaking, which is why she chose print over broadcast media in college. When she’s not typing, she also loves riding non-motorized two-wheelers, going on hikes with her dog, and rocking her electric guitars. Full profile
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