BEAM Robotics. The recently discovered thing that has grabbed ahold of my interest and obsessions of late. Its a simple electronics thing, that also meant it was a good way for me to begin self teaching myself hobby electronics- something I was always interested in learning.

BEAM Robotics is simple. No Computers, controllers, or any of that. And what really appealed to me was that you can make little desktop robots that skitter, race around, roll, flip, etc...  and get this- out of  VCRs and old Cassette Walkmen, Printers, DVD players, etc! Those electronics of old, of which I had several gathering dust, have some really excellent DC motors in them, and even if the device itself is broken, the goodies inside are often just fine! I really like the idea of taking stuff apart (things I do anyway) for materials, putting those parts to use in something completely different, doing so with electronics (that I was interested in as a hobby), and getting little robot critters out of the bargain (Sweet!)

*sigh* It all started with this Book at the local Borders bookstore: "Junkbots, Bugbots, and Bots on wheels"
http://www.solarbotics.com/product/jbb/
...that stopped me dead in my tracks while walking through the bookstore (on my shortcut way to the theater) and compelled me to buy it right then and there. I read through it that night, and was instantly HOOKED.

I started looking through my local Radio Shacks for some of the more exotic components, and found that not much to be found, so, Going online I found this really cool site (which you've already been to if you clicked the above link), that catered to just this sort of geek-ery. Solarbotics.com.

http://www.solarbotics.com/

I'm a little embarrassed at how much money THEY got from me, but when the fedex box arrived, I tore into it like a kid at Christmas. Now I had a bunch of solar cells, motors, IC chips, transistors, etc etc. And promptly got right to work!

This was a few months ago, so these next few posts will be me "catching up" and "showing off" :)