Here’s the latest list as of Friday, 17th June 2016, so you can source your own ChickBot parts and go independent – which is absolutely fine, we encourage it. We know this combination of parts will work as it’s the same list as the first ChickBot prototype.
Item |
Comment |
Qty |
Pack price |
eBay UK |
Arduino Nano |
The brain of the StepperBot – will need some soldering |
1 |
£1.48 |
eBay UK |
Stepper Motor with driver board |
The stepper motor & interface board |
2 |
£1.08 |
eBay UK |
Connectors M-F |
Connection wires |
1 |
£0.99 |
eBay UK |
Connectors M-M |
Connection wires |
1 |
£0.99 |
eBay UK |
Breadboard |
Circuit mount board for the Nano |
1 |
£0.99 |
eBay UK |
Motor mount |
Mounting for the stepper motors |
1 |
£4.50 |
eBay UK |
Base plate |
A5 sheet of 3mm ply for mounting everything |
1 |
£0.99 |
eBay UK |
Battery box |
Battery pack – batteries not included! |
1 |
£0.99 |
eBay UK |
Tyres |
The wheels – will need centre hole widening |
1 |
£0.99 |
eBay UK |
Caster |
Half a ping pong ball! |
1 |
£0.99 |
eBay UK |
Many of these items have more than you need in, which makes the one off cost of the list above £15.07 but you only use £7.54 worth of parts, the rest being spares or left overs.
This was what inspired us to make ChickBot a club – because we’d like to see people getting together and buying a set of kits so they can have a sub-£10 robot. Here’s the calculations for 2, 5 and 10 kits. As you can see, just two people buying gets the price down to under £10 and there’s even more savings to be had for 5 kits.
Item |
Pack price |
Items in pack |
Packs for 2 kit |
2 kit cost |
Packs for 5 kit |
5 kit cost |
Packs for 10 kit |
10 kit cost |
eBay UK |
Arduino Nano |
£1.48 |
1 |
2 |
£2.96 |
5 |
£7.40 |
10 |
£14.80 |
eBay UK |
Stepper Motor & driver board |
£1.08 |
1 |
4 |
£4.32 |
10 |
£10.80 |
20 |
£21.60 |
eBay UK |
Connectors M-F |
£0.99 |
40 |
1 |
£0.99 |
2 |
£1.98 |
3 |
£2.97 |
eBay UK |
Connectors M-M |
£0.99 |
40 |
1 |
£0.99 |
1 |
£0.99 |
2 |
£1.98 |
eBay UK |
Breadboard |
£0.99 |
2 |
1 |
£0.99 |
3 |
£2.97 |
5 |
£4.95 |
eBay UK |
Motor mount |
£4.50 |
10 |
1 |
£4.50 |
1 |
£4.50 |
2 |
£9.00 |
eBay UK |
Base plate |
£0.99 |
2 |
1 |
£0.99 |
3 |
£2.97 |
5 |
£4.95 |
eBay UK |
Battery box |
£0.99 |
1 |
2 |
£1.98 |
5 |
£4.95 |
10 |
£9.90 |
eBay UK |
Tyres |
£0.99 |
4 |
1 |
£0.99 |
3 |
£2.97 |
5 |
£4.95 |
eBay UK |
Caster |
£0.99 |
12 |
1 |
£0.99 |
1 |
£0.99 |
1 |
£0.99 |
eBay UK |
Total |
|
|
|
£19.70 |
|
£40.52 |
|
£76.09 |
|
££ per robot |
|
|
|
£9.85 |
|
£8.10 |
|
£7.61 |
|
For those with a Raspberry Pi, you can drop the Arduino & the breadboards. You do need to be careful with your Pi as it won’t be able to supply power to the motors and you need to ensure you don’t inadvertently use the wrong voltage on the input pins. You will need some sort of USB battery pack to power your Pi as well as a battery pack for the motors. We’ll get a detailed independent build sorted out asap.
[Yes, that’s a cat jammed up against the camera. Bubble was doing QA on the ChickBot on the desk, bottom right!]