meowbo

• 

• 

  assembled

• 

  dashboard

• 

  hijacking the roomba

Inspiration

giving a worn and torn roomba sitting in the back of a dusty closet a second life, reborn as a cat!

What it does

Runs an LLM + Vision / Voice-based loop with Voice Feedback which assumes control over the physical robot, including its expressive features: Ears, Tail, and Eyes.

Designed for elders who need a maintenance-free companion

How we built it

-We integrated 3 Different Platforms into one: -Our own ESP32 C3 based drive base controller to accurately drive motors and servos by USB Serial. -Waveshare ESP32S3 based 2.8 Inch Circular LCD Controllers to render the eyes, commanded by USB Serial. -Raspberry Pi, with a camera, Microphone, speaker, and its fully occupied USB hub to interconnect all functions, host a flask based manual control interface, and communicate with LLM and voice generation API's.

Challenges we ran into

-We improvised a battery for the drive base with 6x 9V Batteries, connected in 2S3P Configuration, providing safe and consistent power for driving around. -Disassembling the Roomba Motherboard proved difficult, so we instead focused on bypassing the motor controller, soldering wires directly to the motors from the H Bridge Controller. -Waveshare documentation for the displays was obfuscated and limited. We ended up having to dissect the example library code of the drivers to find the correct pinouts, and used it as reference for creating our Serial based program.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

-working mvp -customized cad for ears and tails -stable driving

What we learned

What's next for meowbo

-implementing more environmental sensors (BME280) to monitor safe living conditions -message alert for fall detection, contact medical services / emergency contacts -smart home integration to Alexa, Google Home, Homekit, etc...

Built With

• c++
• claude
• elevenlabsapi
• esp32
• python