Skid-bot with the Retail kit
The following robot uses two-drive wheels and a ski or skid plate in front. Although you can easily build a four-wheel robot, I find that it can be harder to maneuver a four-wheel robot with a high degree of precision. Depending on the balance of a four-wheel robot, the non-driving rubber wheels will provide a large amount of friction that will make it difficult to turn accurately and in a predictable and reproducible manner. Using a skid in the front reduces the amount of friction. In later chapters, we will do a lot of optical line tracking with our robot and for this I want a robot with high maneuverability; thus, we will build a skid-bot. The following steps are meant for the Retail Edition of the kit, but you can easily find pieces to build a skid-bot with the Educational Edition. You will use the following parts from the Bill of Materials in the following screenshot to assemble the skid-bot. If you have the Education Edition, you may want to skip ahead...