A few weeks ago Jenn sent me a video of a robot that a Danish guy named Frits had built out of paint mixing sticks and hot glue. He called it "Yellow Drum Machine", and it basically just drives around until it finds something interesting, and then it plays a drum beat on it, records the beat with a microphone, then plays that back on its giant smokestack-like speaker and taps out other beats along with it, or dances to the music. It was adorable, and I wanted one of my own. As I looked at the pictures more closely, I realized that I actually already had a lot of the motors and sensors that he used to build his, and so it was decided — I have to build one of my own.

I checked out the website he runs, letsmakerobots.com, and saw that it was a community-based site where you can display your own robots, participate in the forums, etc, so I signed up for an account and got involved in the community. Recently, I mentioned on the site that I was building my own version of his robot, and he excitedly offered to help me out by providing tips and explanations of the way his code works, etc.

Mine doesn't have yellow tank treads, so I'm calling mine Little Drum Machine (construction photos). I've made good progress in building the mechanical side of it — it helps a lot to have a woodworker (and his power tools) in the house. My robot looks a little more finished and refined than Frits' version, and I'm kind of sad about that (his has so much character, from its jauntily angled speaker to the big globs of dripping hot glue), but I've found that my instinctive desire to carefully measure, calculate, and plan ahead is surprisingly difficult to overcome. Still, I'm happy about the way it's coming along. Here's a video of my robot driving around and swinging his single drumstick at stuff. (Yup, I've actually started uploading videos to YouTube now. Sadly, no crazy comments calling me a nazy or a moran so far).

Once I finish gluing up another drumstick motor or two, I get to start the fun part — teaching him to play music.