SES-V2 Legged Robots

The Lynxmotion (LSS) – mechDOG Quadrapod was created as a collaboration with MechDickel (RobotShop Community) to create a four-legged quadrapod (“quadruped being the animal equivalent) robot with similar degrees of freedom to a mammal. ST1 modular servos are used throughout, along with a variety of Lynxmotion Servo Erector Set (SES) V2 brackets. The body plates are made of composite G10 and the body side panels are anodized aluminum. The LSS Adapter acts to split battery power to each leg, and can be used with either an Arduino shield-compatible microcontroller or single board computer (SBC) like the Raspberry Pi. The internal compartment can be quickly accessed using thumbscrews at the top. There are mounting points at the top for accessories like YDLidar’s 360 degree laser scanner or other SES V2 brackets. The size of the robot and built-in functionality of the smart servos make it ideally suited as an inexpensive development platform onto which a variety of sensors can be mounted and used for autonomous behaviors, navigation and more.

Lynxmotion ST1 modular smart servos are used throughout, along with a variety of Lynxmotion Servo Erector Set (SES) V2 brackets. The body plates are made of composite G10 and the body side panels are anodized aluminum. The included LSS Adapter acts to split battery power and communication to each leg, and can be used with either an Arduino shield-compatible microcontroller (ex. Arduino Uno or Lynxmotion BotBoarduino) or single board computer (SBC) like the Raspberry Pi 3 or 4 (note that to power a Raspberry Pi from the same battery as the robot, we suggest using the LSS-5VR module, sold separately).

The internal compartment can be quickly accessed using thumbscrews to remove the top plate of the robot. There are also mounting points on the top plate for accessories like YDLidar’s X2 360 degree laser scanner or other SES V2 brackets (to add a pan/tilt or simple robotic arm). The size of the robot and built-in functionality of the smart servos make it ideally suited as a quadrapod 12DoF legged development platform onto which a variety of sensors can be mounted and used for autonomous behaviors, navigation and more.

Incorporating Lynxmotion’s Smart Servo Motors (rather than small 9g RC servos commonly used in small tabletop quadrapods, or BLDC motors for larger quadrapods) gives the developer significant control over and feedback from the servos. Possible configurations of each servo include angular range, center position, direction, speed, LED color, operating mode (serial vs. RC) and more. Feedback per servo (in serial mode) includes but is not limited to: absolute angular positioning, voltage, current, speed, temperature, servo status. The servos use a “human readable” communication protocol, making them very easy to use and understand. Arduino, Python and ROS libraries are available for the servos.