This is an OPEN SOURCE outdoor garden robot that can mow grass and water plants for under $400. It features a powerful 3000 watt C6374 motor for mowing grass with electronic height control, and a large Nema17 turret system for watering at target places that supports a normal garden hose. The rover currently uses a 9 axis IMU + wheel encoders for autonomous function. The brain of this rover is a powerful ESP32-P4, which gives this rover the capability to listen and respond to commands using its built in microphone and speaker.

I spend hours each week gardening and mowing grass. As someone into robotics, I realized I could build a garden rover to automate some of these repetitive chores. This project gave me a reason to learn more about robotics while building something useful for my yard.

Watch the demo video here: 

To see the full build instructions, SOURCE CODE, schematics, BILL OF MATERIALS, and SOURCE CAD, view the build instructions:

Github Repo 

See the full 134 hour documentation journal here:

https://macondo.hackclub.com/projects/9276 

Features

• Under $400, anyone can build it
• All four wheels are motorized
• C6374 Motor offers 3000W+ of power, more than most commercial systems
• Nema17 planetary motors lift and raise the mower using a rope system.
• The turret system uses high reduction worm + dual stage planetary drives to shoot water
• Has a microphone and speaker and can run small ai vision/text recognition models
• Water flow can be controlled using a seperate esp32 controller
• Can be controlled from a phone or handheld controller
• Uses a 9axis imu and encoders on all four wheels for precise autonomous
• The aluminum chassis bends and acts as a suspension
• Supports raspberry pi 5 with ROS 2 as brain
• Supports a custom hand held controller from my previous FPV claw drone project
• Advanced flexibility for conneting new sensors, cameras, and electronics
• Water resistant

Future Plans

• Add cameras and GPS+RTK to the autonomous sensors
• Use stronger drivetrain motors to support a higher speed and better turning (though it would increase the price to build)
• Replace garden hose adapter system with a water tank onboard the rover
• Make a custom PCB that combines all the electronics and sub systems into one board with quick connectors for peripherals (much more expensive though)