Hi, my NXT Axle Sorter is finished. This machine works with a Lego Mindstorms NXT 2.0 and an IR Link sensor. 

The little car that you see puts the axles in the right containers. The large 'building' with AXLE measures the length of an axle with the color sensor as you can see in the video. 

The little car drives over some gear racks. The ultrasone sensor reads the distance and the IR Link sensor sends the signals to the little car. 

Here you can see the inside of the machine:

The machine sorts normal axles. Also the new colors (example: the red 4)

 

If you want to sort your axles you need to do these five steps
1. Put the axles in the machine
2. Press the button on the NXT
3. Have a drink
4. Take the containers with the sorted axles out of the machine
5. Make your next Lego Creation

 

If you want more pictures about some details, let me know. 

 

Here is the video:

 

Edited December 29, 20168 yr by Paul Klop

Great project, Paul.  I like the removable containers and the car that distributes the axles.  It looks like you put a lot of thought into this. 

Edited December 29, 20168 yr by BusterHaus
Saved too early.

1 hour ago, BusterHaus said:

Great project, Paul.  I like the removable containers and the car that distributes the axles.  It looks like you put a lot of thought into this. 

Thank you! The most difficult part was of course the programming... Also, it was difficult to make sure that there is only one axle at the same time in the machine. Otherwise, the color sensor reads two axles at the same time. 

Simply awesome, like the toll road was! 

5 minutes ago, jotta93 said:

Simply awesome, like the toll road was! 

Thank you very much! 

Impressive! I like these type of practical machines. What I did not understand from the video is how you make sure that only one axle at the time is sent for scanning. What is the function of the grey bricks? Have you had jams?

1 hour ago, WvG_853 said:

Impressive! I like these type of practical machines. What I did not understand from the video is how you make sure that only one axle at the time is sent for scanning. What is the function of the grey bricks? Have you had jams?

Thank you! The grey bricks prevents that two axles at the same time fall onto the second conveyor belt. Between the grey bricks there's only space for one axle. 

Here's a little video:

https://goo.gl/photos/PFwrRdb23MxjXc9f7

 

This black 'thing' makes only space for one axle. If there are laying two axles on top of each other, this brick stops the second one. I had almost no jams. 

 

Thanks for your question!

Nice project you got here! How does the color sensor determine if an axle is passing? Is this by a change in color compared to the background, because you are using a blue brick there? This way it could also sort different colors of axles with the same size.

1 hour ago, vertigo33 said:

Nice project you got here! How does the color sensor determine if an axle is passing? Is this by a change in color compared to the background, because you are using a blue brick there? This way it could also sort different colors of axles with the same size.

Yes, that is that's entirely true. There is no blue axle so I used the blue brick. You can also use a green brick but not a yellow one. 

It can also sorts different colors of axles but I didn't programmed it because I sort the axles by size, not by color. But if you want to sort it by color and size you can make that .

Thanks for the explanation and video. Clever solution ... 

This is indeed a cool application of using LEGO to sort LEGO...excellent. Just a thought, can't this be done without NXT. Basically slots with the correct length would do the trick. What do you guys think?

On 30-12-2016 at 3:46 PM, WvG_853 said:

Thanks for the explanation and video. Clever solution ... 

No problem 

On 31-12-2016 at 0:23 PM, 2LegoOrNot2Lego... said:

This is indeed a cool application of using LEGO to sort LEGO...excellent. Just a thought, can't this be done without NXT. Basically slots with the correct length would do the trick. What do you guys think?

Yes your are right. This is what Akiyuky did with his axle sorter. I wanted something with mindstorms and PF so I made this. But their are more solution to sort axles . Sorry for the late reaction.. 

Thanks for your reply and it makes perfect sense!!!