Robotic Monday: Brick Sorter

Name of Model: Brick Sorter 4

Created by: Laurens Valk

Found at: http://www.freewebs.com/laurens201/bricksorter4.htm

Details: This is the latest in a series of robots that attempts to sort LEGO bricks. I've seen quite a few brick sorters in my day, but most of them are fairly primitive machines that need to be fed pieces individually and only sort by color (not by size). This one, on the other hand, makes use of both an RCX and an NXT to automate everything - it sorts sizes and colors, and it can work directly from a pile of bricks dumped into the top of it. A bit of cheating was used here, but I suspect that it would be possible to create a version of this that doesn't involve cheating - but that would take a bit more time. The summary explains that a third-party sensor is used to allow the NXT to choose programs on the RCX, and a phototransistor is used to allow for more accurate color readings in a relatively small size (that LEGO camera would have been a bit more bulky and would have required a full computer...) All in all, this is another brilliant 'bot by Laurens. No building instructions this time out, but there are directions concerning the programs provided.