Intermediate Robot Building (Technology in Action)

Good book!

This takes some reading and not for the short attention span crowd. As much as anything it gives a good basis from which to further develop your own path.

This book was well received by my 12 year old grandson AND his dad! They both were totally absorbed after my grandson opened this birthday present and planning a project.

Good intro books to electronics and robot related electronics, for those future brilliant minds. I would recommend this. to anyone with interest in this subject and needed a place to start.

This book and Cook's beginning book are a couple of books I find very useful. Check out his robot room ([...]) for a glimpse into his style.

Good product

David Cook, builds advanced skills in autonomous robot construction in an excellently designed text following on (but not necessarily depending upon) his excellent "Robot Building for Beginners". This outstanding tutorial assumes some basic skills in robot construction, and then describes and exquisitely illustrates the development of Machining, Mechanical, Electronic, and Microcontroller Modules around a "Roundabout Robot" Project. Mr. Cook builds out independently the skills used in each phase or area of robot construction around a suggested unified project. The Robot Constructor Hobbyist can rely on standard pre-planned modules for those aspects of robot construction that are of lessor interest while choosing to advance his/her skills in particular areas that are described in detail for the "Roundabouts" construction, gaining Machine Shop Skills, Electronic Design and Construction toolsets, or advanced skills in developing the Microcontroller "Brains" of a Robot. While I could just admire and learn from his explicit instructions and high-quality gray-scale photographs of Machining Practice, I do feel qualified to comment on his "Brains" and Microcontroller module entitled "If I Only Had A Brain". In this section he proceeds lightly with the details of Physical Computing and Basic Microcontroller skills that can easily be gathered from other books and online references, he provides an excellent guide to choosing between discrete Digital Logic chips and Microcontrollers, excellent heuristics in choosing a controller or Microcomputer chip, and advanced means of troubleshooting and making failsafe the Microcontroller Brain of a Robot using Watchdog Timers and Heartbeat Displays. I know of no other Hobbyist or "Professional" Robotics book that provides this level of understanding of the Intermediate and Advanced Use of Microcontrollers and Microcomputers.This book is the Ultimate Skill Builder for the Robotics Hobbyist who wishes to advance beyond the simplest robot projects.

David Cook's second book is an excellent sequel to the first. Like thefirst, this is a hobbyist book aimed at those interested in table toprobotics. It documents his exploration in robotics using easy to getparts for most hobbyists, and does good job of explaining the basictheory to the layperson. A basic understanding of electronics andmechanics is useful to take away as much as possible from the book,but with just the skills learned in the first book, it is easy to copyhis simple designs.By no means is this an advanced book. Those with some background inelectronics or computer science may find the book a bit lacking on thetheory behind the designs, but it hits it's target demographic quitewell. Anyone who has built a small robot or is familiar with circuitswill have no trouble following even the more advanced topics in thisbook.He includes a brief overview of the basic parts of any robot. Thefirst section includes several examples on the mechanical constructionof a robot. Many of the examples include mechanical parts customfabricated on a mechanical mill, though sources for similar parts areincluded. He then discusses power supply and isolation concepts. Alarge part of the book discusses various approaches of brushed DCmotor driving using NPN transistors or MOSFETs, and is probably one ofthe more valuable sections. There is a short section on sensor designbut the examples presented in detail are somewhat sparse. Finally, asection on interfacing a controller (purpose built or programmable) tothe hardware is gone over. This section is by far the most lacking, asthis book is more focused on the hardware implementation.Overall, the book presents a good guide to getting a simple tabletoprobot up and running, but doesn't discuss much of the more advancedtopics a budding roboticist might find useful. This is by no means asoftware book, but by the time you're done with the examples in thisbook, you'll have a good platform for mobile robot programming.