Building a robot using the new Raspberry Pi Zero W

I’ve wanted to build a robot for as long as I could remember and with the price of the electronics needed to do so falling exponentionally now feels like the right time.

My initial plan is to build a small two wheeled rover that I can control using the arrow keys of my computer. The new Raspberry Pi Zero W is absurdly small and includes wifi and bluetooth which makes it perfect for this type of project. Hunting around on amazon I found this platform with two motors and a caster which is ideal. To provide PWM control to these motors I’m using the Picon Zero hat which has two outputs for motors and additional inputs and outputs for adding sensors and servers in future.

For remote control I will write a basic programme that uses the arrow keys as input and moves the robot forwards, backwards and rotates left and right. I’ll then SSH to the Pi and pilot it around my flat. If all goes well I'll think about additional sensors I can add to allow for additional functionality and automation.