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Basic Construction

Topics
Design principles
General familiarity with robots

Preparation
Enough kits for groups of 3-4.
Pre-program each RCX with sample programs (see bottom for examples) that only use motors. Having a program that moves the robot erratically around the floor and crashes into walls helps emphasize the need for solidly constructed robots.

Handouts
Tankbot building instructions (designed by Carnegie Mellon)

Lesson
Have the students form groups of 3-4. Give each group a kit and instruct them to build a robot that has 2 motors, 4 wheels and an RCX. An example robot may be shown briefly but should be removed once the building starts.

Instructors should wander to all the groups suggesting ways to build more durable robots. Instructors should also make use of the pre-programmed programs to show why some designs work better than others

After all the groups have a working robot hand out the tankbot instructions and have all the groups build it. It is ok if the end robot varies slightly but it works better if all the groups have simmiler robots.

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