Unboxing MOSS - Modular Robotics

Date:  July 9, 2014

Back in December 2013, I funded and backed this project on the kickstarted.

I find the project very innovative and it can teach young kids about the concepts of robotics, and programming.

This is what MOSS does.  I love it a lot.

Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/v/664X-pCfgik

So, finally today it came.  After I paid UPS the 7% GST as my shipment is above $300.

Very appropriate packaging.  And the manual is quite simple and precise too.  Easy to understand.

Let’s build our first robot.

Which consist of 1) Battery block (the bottom block with I/O switch), 2) the proximity sensor, where the black sensor hole will sense your hand movement, 3) a motor block which will spin when receiving power from the battery.  The battery block is charged using the normal micro USB.

Interesting… When you move your hand, the motor will spin, until a “sweet spot” it will stop spinning, and beyond that, it spin the other director.

Let’s try it out.  

Wow, cool!  And it works!

Let’s build a more complicated robot.  A Kapreblewongtron.  What a weird name.

I still don’t understand what does the Brightness Sensor’s usage in this robot.  But soon I will find out after I read all the manual.

The instruction page is quite easy to understand.

Continue building.

Finally some touch up.  They even give you some challenging questions.  For you to find out.

Here is our first robot mouse.  It does looks a little tiny bit like a mouse.

What does it do?  Let’s check it out.  If you place your hand in front of it’s face, then mouse will stop there and wiggle its tail.

Quite cool, is it not?  

So, I told young Kay Kay, this toy is for him to understand Robotics.  As Jay Jay already have his Lego Mindstorms.   

The robot construction kits does come with blue tooth connectivity to connect with iPhone or Android MOSS app.  You can add the double-brain block and then, let the app to remote control your robot.  Cool.  

There are still many many things to explore.  Will reveal other robots in next blogs.

Of course, since we are doing Robotics, I will teach the kids the Three Laws of Robotics.