Robot Starter kit Bluetooth firmware update

#13

So finally a success story!

The firmware that works with the Android app is the GitHub version one

Now the problem is that you have the older board (guessing because you connect BT to port #4) and I do not know if that accesses the Serial port in the same way. There is also


for your board but it might be some older version that will not work.

I suspect that the driver upload from the mobile app failed for you because you are using the older board. The tech support here is incompetent enough to not know .

BTW Scratch uses different firmware (though it uses a similar protocol so it might be an older version or something). The sources are packaged with Scratch and you can compile it yourself for your board.

For the record (if somebody has a similar problem) the app wasn’t upgrading the robot for me because of some problem in my phone. It worked well from my wife’s phone.

My current use-case mostly about controlling the robot over BT and, luckily, for that I can use the Scratch or mobile phone app firmware. I’ll use the same serial protocol that Scratch uses.

#14

Now they updated the Android app and it works with my phone. That’s good.

I am still annoyed how much time I spent with the different ways to connect BT all subtly broken in different ways. And I didn’t even started about other problems like DC motor connectors turned by 90 degrees (=> they face downwards in the second model), voltage dropping when I turn on both engines (=> Arduino resets; I had to connect an extra USB charger to the car) and the motors not being powerful enough to turn the tank (even with new batteries). All of this while getting zero feedback from Makeblock here on the forums (and judging from the other threads this is their normal behavior).

This is not the way to build a successful start-up. Makeblock if you reading this, please put more work to your product to make better. The hardware is actually very nice so do not spoil it!

#15

Hi Michal,

Moving the BT module to the port #5, I’ve finally been able to connect to
the Robot Tank from the Scratch application.
I’ve also been able to connect with an iOS (8) application but this was not
very stable (the application seems to crash, so it does with Android 4.4.2
on my Galaxy Tab).

So, this is really a mix feeling for me.
Thanks for your help.
Regards.

#16

Hi Bixator,

I feel your pain. I spent tons of time debugging what was wrong because the app couldn’t upgrade the firmware. With multiple poorly documented options most of them broken in some subtle ways it took me a while to find the right combination to connect anything to the BT. For some reason my wife’s LG Android phone worked better and after their latest upgrade I was able to use my phone too.

One thing you can try is to drive the robot with connected USB charger. When I turned both motors on, I saw voltage drops that were resetting the Arduino board. Perhaps that can crash the app too (though some BT flakiness).

This is not the only problem I am seeing. I seem to be affected by this http://forum.makeblock.cc/t/dc-motor-connector-angle/790 too. I hope that the developers will wake up after the Chinese New Year and respond to some of these comments. At this moment, I have a serious love hate relationship with their product (love for the HW and hate for SW + documentation). I would certainly not recommend it to beginners.

BTW is your tank able to turn around? Mine doesn’t have strong enough motors (even with fresh batteries). I had to build the tricycle thou driving on the carpet is still out of question.

#17

Hi Michal,

Yes, my tank was able to turn in IR mode. To be honest, the tank worked fine
Out of the Box when using the IR remote control.
The things got more complicated when:

  • I wanted to bring the programming tools to my son (Aduino IDE is too much complex for a kid, ArduBlock UI interface does not handle enough blocks and Scratch requires a live connection with the Tank)
  • I’ve purchased the Dual Mode Bluetooth Adapter and try to use the iOS and Android application to remote control the tank.

There was a new iOS update today which I’ve downloaded on my iPhone.
I’ve then connected to the tank, the iOS application requested yet an
other FW update which I did and which went fine.
Unfortunately, I can not get control on the tank anymore with this setup…

I’m on the point of giving up on this product and I start looking for alternatives…

Thanks.
Regards.

#18

Lets wait until the end of Chinese New Year when the staff is back from holidays. But I understand your frustration. the whole point of this product is to be accessible for beginners. There are way too many problems.

See also my comment here:

#19

I also had this exact problem… Also the Orion block whines now after it attempted the firmware update. So I have flipped that switch off. At some point, I believe after I turned off my bluetooth head set for my phone things just started to work. I am still not sure how that resolved the issue.

#20

After assembling my Bluetooth Robot Starter Kit, I have been unable to get it to do anything other than beep and blink lights at me since then. I have successfully performed many previous uploads to the Rambo board on my 3d printer (the RAMBO is an arduino compatible board that has all the motor drivers, fan and heat sensor connections etc for 3d printing). I had issues with uploading to Uno/Orion initially because I had left the Bluetooth and ultrasonic sensor connected to the board while trying to upload. Thanks to the fellow that suggested unplugging them before uploading as that did the trick and now it seems to upload ok. The machine still doesn’t do anything though. I can’t get the bluetooth app on my HTC to successfully connect to the robot. There isn’t anything in the sketch that mentions bluetooth, so I’m wondering if I uploaded the correct sketch. I used the sketch that was linked previously. When I try to upload the same sketch with the bluetooth portion from the master library added on and that test bluetooth patch won’t compile due to something not being declared. I am not an arduino programmer yet, so I am unsure how to properly declare it. The bluetooth module does light up and blink and I can see it on my HTC phone, but I can’t get it to connect. It fails every time.

#21

Hi @Gr8Scott,

Which version of sketch did you use here?

#22

There isn’t anything in the sketch that mentions bluetooth

This confused me too for some time but it is correct. The Bluetooth is accessed through Serial. There doesn’t need to be anything BT specific in the sketch.

#23

V1.20101 is the version I used of the mbot firmware. Is this old? I thought it was current. If it is current, what else should I look at to get this puppy connecting to bluetooth and operating on it’s own using the ultrasonic sensor?

#24

Hi @Gr8Scott,

Please check these things below,

  1. The Bluetooth module should be connected to Port_5(Makeblock Orion, if it is Baseboard, connect to Port_4)
  2. If you have upload the firmware to Orion, when you open the App and click the button at the bottom right corner, the screen should like this,

Could you find the "Makeblock"here? Choose it and click the top right corner, then wait for a second, the Bluetooth should be connected.

When the Bluetooth is connected between module and phone, the blue LED (on the Bluetooth module)should keep lighted. If it is not, the LED should keep blink.

#25

Tried switching ports and that didn’t change anything. Tried uploading the baseboard sketch instead of the mbot sketch and nothing changed then either. Also switched ports from 5 to 4 and back repeatedly. The robot never tried to move and the bluetooth never hooked up. It says it ‘failed’.

#26

Hi @Gr8Scott,

Please wait for a moment, our engineer is checking on this bug.

#27

Sorry for the iOS app has a wrong firmware file. The new firmware for orion is updated.Please check it , if your app doesn’t work for control dc motors. https://github.com/Makeblock-official/Makeblock-Firmware/tree/master/tool
the source:https://github.com/Makeblock-official/Makeblock-Firmware/tree/master/mblock_firmware

#28

This is explains why when I connected with my iOS tablet to control my robot that it hosed things up. I then went back to the android and after a 3 times it finally stopped asking to upload firmware and allowed me to use Makeblock again.

#29

I am using android btw.

#30

I too had trouble initially. The Android App now works every time.

I couldn’t figure out how to use the Audrino IDE to upload (I suspect it had to do with the Bluetooth being hooked up now after reading more).

I use codebender.cc to upload test sketches to ensure the board itself was working.

I then installed and used scratch and updated the firmware through scratch and USB.

I turned off the on board speaker that likes to scream at me.

I then tried again with the Android app, it uploaded the firmware and showed a pairing screen and code to accept pairing.

I then was able to control the robot, and have no further problems with the android app.

#31

Your english looks great to me Jachred. I thank you for the information. Seems like I’m not actually uploading anything through codebender. I think this may be the same issue I have been having with using the arduino programming software. I’m using the arduino Uno as the board and port 3 automatically shows up with no other options for ports. The manual tells me to select port 8 IIRC, but that port never shows up as an option for me.

#32

I used Chrome 32 Bit (64 Bit doesn’t work). With the codebender plugin and driver for an Ardruino Uno.

https://github.com/Makeblock-official/Makeblock-Library/tree/master/makeblock

Downloaded as a ZIP and uploaded to codebender as a custom library.

Also

is the one I used but I notice there is an updated one there from 2 days ago.

I uploaded that as well. Then I just chose the RGB light show and Motor Sketches from the Library and uploaded them into the board.

I am not good at writing my apologies. I normally don’t post on forums because of my poor writing skills.