first I really like how far u developed farmbot since I first noticed it at the beginning of 2016. The tools, componence and especially the software and homepage looks really stunning. The simplicity and efficenzy is a real ruler in your development.
What I think about could be a next step is to use farmbot only to produce small plants and bring the small plants with another mobile robot out to a open larger field. This could improve the production of the robotsystem and make it at the same time more interessting for communities and smaller farmings.
The mobile robot could also provide same or advanced skills of farmbot. I would be really interessed if there would be a discussion of next step or versions and designs. Maybe I also could support it.
That’s a pretty neat concept and probably quite do-able! I bet it would help to have FarmBot tend to plants that are started out in small pots, then FarmBot could (when the plant is ready) pick up the pot and load it into the other robot. That robot could go transplant it somewhere and bring the empty pot back. Perhaps even the pots could be biodegradable so that the secondary robot could put the whole thing in the ground and not need to worry about pulling it out which would be mechanically challenging for a robot.
Feel free to drop more links in here or post about any progress you make!
hey rory. thx ure answer, makes me happy how open source goes on. i’m thinking about concepts but not finished jet. it’s very challenging to think of a concept that it is easy to produce, because all that gears, bearings and engines. i think a mobile farmbot that will be successfull has to work off grid so it can work all the season remotly even on a field far from civilisation. maybe light solarpanels 2 x 2 meters could work, also u dont need a big battery, if power is produced just in time. other bot i like a lot cause of its mobility and light look is swag bot. also from australia. www.youtube.com/watch?v=cZVUYJhXXzo
Jerome and myself are working on both topics ( mobile/off-grid + compatible starter kits )
We are waiting for the 1.3 release and updated documentation to start the real work on mob/off-g
For the starter kits, we think we don’t need individual pots but a special table which has reversible pots attached to it (not removable ones), and fetch the seedles with a clamp or dedicated tool like this http://www.leevalley.com/en/shopping/AddViews.aspx?p=60535
Best way would be to have the same hardware/software solution, just different modules. I don’t think that we need a robot for transportation at first, packaging the starter pots in boxes with human transportation seems enough to us
Anyway, I guess we’ll explain some work online around late July, please get in touch if you want to participate
For french people, feel free to come we are working on it at this place : https://le240.fr
being able to use Farmbot in this way feels like it might be viable in other ways as well. I can imagine using a Farmbot to raise tomatoes and other plants from seed for sale in poverty stricken regions, either as a promotional program to raise awareness, or as a way to bring in grant money for further research, since it can be used to grow plants, and give local growers information on the best growing practices…
