BarBot

We want to create a BarBot.

Initial Goals

Force sensitive resistors for glass detection & liquid quantity
Carriages with scissor lifts to activate Optivends (and thus everything else)
Circular track/path to automatically reuse a carriage.
Ways of bypassing unused dispensers to allow for drinks leapfrogging.
Raspberry Pi for main controller, Arduino-likes for carriages
3D print our own peristaltic pumps?
HackADay links to check out here
A barbot is essentially a vending machine, mine vending machines for mechanisms & ideas.
Drill chuck like cup grabber

Standardised glasses, like these or these.
Glasses are loaded in corner as a stack of 20 in a column
Glasses travel on a large carousel
Mini-carousels for spirits, lever mechanism to operate Optics
Peristaltic pumps for soft drinks
Hoppers and screws for garnishes
Fits in a transparent ~1 meter cube, interesting things to see from all 4 sides.
Use a RPi for management, connected to a touch screen for order taking and an RFID reader (TikiTag?) for customer tracking
Use LIN or CAN bus nodes for modular management; a node for cup carousel, a node for a spirit carousel etc...
- Freescale KL05 FRDM boards for each node, a specialised shield to tailor the node for it's role.
- LIN Spec here.
Lots of sensors for fully closed loop control
See here for block diagram

Start with the rails and carriage, let it grow from there

Rail specification:
- Carriages are independently powered so we can have 2+ and they can move independently
- Rail should be cheap and quick to make
- Monorails are cool
- Rail system should support switches(points)/overtaking/corners/loops and be small, light and cheap