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Virtually everyone has played Simon, that electronic memory game from the 70s, but who among us has actually beaten it? That was the goal of [Ben] and his 7-year-old daughter, and after a year of work, an Arduino, some servos, and a few Lego bricks, they’ve finally done it.

Instead of the large original Simon, [Ben] is using a key chain version of the game: much smaller, and much easier to build a device to sense the lights and push the buttons. The arms are made from Lego bricks, held up with rubber bands and actuated with two servos mounted on a polycarbonate cutting board.

To detect Simon’s lights, [Ben] connected four phototransistors to an Arduino. The Arduino records the pattern of lights on the Simon, and activates the Lego arms in response to that pattern. [Ben]‘s version of Simon has only a maximum of 32 steps in the final sequence, but that still means each game takes 528 button presses – and a lot of annoying beeps – to complete.

Videos below.

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NooTrix submitted us a 4-part tutorial to build a Lego Mindstorm Elevator controlled by an Arduino Uno:

 The elevator is built using components from an old Lego Mindstorms RCX 1.5. For the control part, we use an Arduino Uno board instead of the obsolete Lego RCX brick. The motor and sensors are from Lego. The connection to motor is done using a set of transistors organized in a H-Bridge.

The goal of the project is to show how to control Lego parts (motor, sensors, …) using an Arduino:

the elevator carries a smartphone and keep it level which is useful for taking snapshots of documents instead of scanning them. Full description, a step by step tutorial, as well as pictures, videos are available online.

All circuit schematics and source code are released under a free open source license (creative commons).

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I started 2 years ago with an autonomous rover that chases light and avoids obstacles. We're now 11 versions further and version 12 is almost ready! Eventually the rover must cruise around without hitting any objects and return to a charging station when the battery runs low. I'll show you the evolution of the rover, starting with version 2 (version 1 was crap)

Version 2

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This robot waters the plants while you're on holiday! You have to line up the plants and through a GUI in Microsoft Access you can input the water demands per plant (how many times per week the plant needs water and how much). The water reservoir contains a mixer and an aeration unit (through lego compressors) to avoid dead water. The only thing not lego about it is the water pump and the robot is controlled by an Arduino Duemilanove. I've used a selfmade multipurpose motor driver pcb so all the electronics visisble aren't used ;)

Samuel Cox, a maker who defined himself as a mix of “design, ideas and technology“, has invented a brand-new competition for digital citizens: Digilympics.

From his website:

2012 is not only the year of the Olympics, but also the launch of the first ever ‘Digilympics’, a twitter-powered race for sporting success where you determine the outcome. Four Lego athletes move down a physical racetrack as fans Tweet their team to move them further towards the finish line.

Starting today (07/18/2012), the Digilympics will be a two-week event as the four teams – UK, US, Canada and Japan – compete for the prestigious Digilympics Gold Medal.

The competition is open to anyone on the web, allowing them to Tweet their team to success using one of four unique Twitter accounts (UK_Digi, US_Digi, CA_Digi &JP_Digi). Tweets in support of a particular account will move that country’s contestant physically along a running track.

After each race, the team victories are recorded and contestants go back to the starting line. At the end of the week the team who has won the most races will be given the Gold Medal online at digilympics.com

Under the hood, this funny race is enabled by a Processing sketch that seeks for Twitter replies on each account: a new reply triggers a motor-shield equipped Arduino board, which provides the movement to each athlet.

More information can be found here. And… let’s start twitting for your favourite team! ^^

[Via: Samuel Cox's Digilympics]

Who knew Lego characters had to be somewhere in a hurry? Adafruit did, as it just whipped up a minifig-sized train schedule. The invention mates one of Adafruit's own 1-inch OLED boards with an Arduino Uno controlling the schedule behind the scenes. It looks to be a straightforward project for the DIY types, although the display is currently all show: the schedule doesn't (yet) pair up with the train tracks to automatically let your minifigs know if their trip to the pirate spaceship castle has been delayed by ghosts. You can check the source link for the full instructions. Duplo builders, alas, are kept out of the loop.

OLED Lego train station emerges from Adafruit and Arduino gear, minifigs to get home on time originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 26 Jun 2012 00:07:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.