PiCy - the Tiny Raspberry Pi Powered Robot!

Build your own tiny Raspberry Pi based robot out of a few easy to obtain bits!

You will need:

• A Raspberry Pi.
• A PiCy pack kit, which contains:
  • Two motors and two wheels.
  • A battery holder for two AA batteries with battery clip.
  • Two 40mm M4 bolts with two M4 nuts.
  • Some wire (roughly 20cm of red, 10cm of green and 10cm of purple).
  • 3 pieces of double sided sticky tape or sticky foam.
  • One Raspberry Pi Case.
• 2 AA batteries.
• A soldering iron and solder.
• Wire cutters
• Small flat bladed screwdriver.

This Instructables will only concern the building of the robot. To learn how to control the robot over bluetooth or Wifi check further the tutorial here.

First solder cables and battery connector onto PicoBorg.

Solder the red wires to M1+ and M4+.

Solder the red wire from the battery clip to the V+ hole.

Solder the black wire from the battery clip to the GND hole.

Solder the purple wire to M1-

And finally solder the green wire to the M4-

Give each wire a little tug to check it is connected securely.

Your PicoBorg should look like the third picture in this step.

Next, pop the expansion tab out of the case. With a little force with a screwdriver, it should come off fairly easily.

Thread the wires and battery connector through the expansion tab hole.

Bend the wires away from the black GPIO connector and around the PicoBorg.

Fit the long M4 nylon screws, and secure them with the nylon M4 nuts.

You can optionally also mount your Raspberry Pi to the case using the metal screws that come with the case.

Carefully line up the holes of the PicoBorg socket with the GPIO expansion header of the Raspberry Pi and push down on the edges of the PicoBorg to fit. Be careful to push from the edges of the board as the soldered pins on the top of the board can be a bit sharp!

Snap on the lid!

Without using any of the double sided sticky tape, line up the battery holder and the motors on the back of the case. Make sure there is enough length in the wires to attach to the battery holder and the motors.

Take the battery pack and attach it to the case.

Then attach the motors, making sure the the wires reach the motors and battery holder.

If you've used glue rather than sticky tape, leave it to dry.

Take the wheels and attach them to the motors. The axles are keyed so take a little force to push on.

Route the wires to the motors. Red should be closest to the case on both motors. Make sure you leave room for the Raspberry Pi’s SD card and USB power cable.

Trim the cables if desired.

Strip a small amount of plastic outer coating from the wires to solder to and carefully solder the wires to the motors. You may need a second pair of hands to hold the wires in place whilst you solder.

One red wire should be soldered on the closest connection to the case on each one of the motors.

Solder the green and purple wires to the connectors that are left, one going to each side.

Place the robot on the ground.

The posts may be too long for the wheels to touch the ground and need a little trim. You should be able to fit a coin underneath without it lifting off the ground.

If they don't need a trim, you're done!

Add some AA batteries to the robot and away you go!

The Raspberry Pi can be powered by USB power cable or a battery pack.

Get started with the control software in our tutorial here. And there's further PiCy pack programs to play with here!