Using Lego Mindstorm sensors with an Orangutan controller

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1

Hi,

Has anyone tried hooking up any of the Lego Mindstorm NXT sensors to an Orangutan controller?

Here’s an example of one of the sensors: shop.lego.com/ByTheme/Product.aspx?p=9846&cn=17

The sensors seem to have both digital (I2C) and analog interfaces.

Any tips would be appreciated. Also, if anyone knows of a good website that has the nitty gritty technical details of the Lego sensor interace, I would appreciate a link.

Thanks,
Mike

2

All of the Orangutan controllers have the capability of doing I2C communication, because the AVR processor has an I2C module (though they call it 2-Wire) and the two I/O pins used by that module are free. Here is an app note about using I2C on the Orangutan SV-328 to talk to a sensor:
pololu.com/docs/0J33

The Orangutan controllers also all have analog inputs, so you could use those to read your sensors, but I recommend trying to get the I2C working because it should allow you to connect many sensors using only two I/O lines, I think.

-David