{"id":1627,"date":"2018-04-12T08:16:37","date_gmt":"2018-04-12T15:16:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/partofthething.com\/thoughts\/?p=1627"},"modified":"2018-08-18T20:11:46","modified_gmt":"2018-08-19T03:11:46","slug":"the-hero-jr-personal-robot-from-heathkit-a-1984-product-way-ahead-of-its-time","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/partofthething.com\/thoughts\/the-hero-jr-personal-robot-from-heathkit-a-1984-product-way-ahead-of-its-time\/","title":{"rendered":"The Hero Jr. personal robot from HeathKit: a 1984 product way ahead of its time"},"content":{"rendered":"

One of my first memories is a vision of lying near my dad in the basement in the mid-1980s while he endlessly soldered away at some big project. Later, I spent a lot of my childhood messing around with the product he was assembling: a Hero Jr. robot. This was a educational personal robot, intended to be your “friend, companion, and security guard.” Here he is:<\/p>\n

\"Hero<\/a>
My family’s Hero Jr.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Hero Jr. has a sonar, infrared motion sensor, light sensor, sound sensor, radio-frequency remote, drive motor, obstruction sensor, and a RS-232 serial port. His out-of-the-box features included a security guard mode, alarm clock, poetry, singing, and (my favorite) the ability to explore around the house, often while singing America, Daisy Bell, <\/em>or Little Miss Muffet<\/em>.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\"Hero<\/a>
Hero Jr.’s drive motor. Drive motor… OK.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Hero Jr. was created by the Michigan company, HeathKit<\/a>, which is famous for designing and selling high-quality electronics kits since 1926. (but is now, sadly, gone<\/del> UPDATE: It filed for bankruptcy in 2012 but is still operating<\/a> today to some degree). As with most HeathKit products, Hero Jr. came as a kit, you had to mount and solder every component onto the circuit boards and install the motors, speakers, and sensors. It cost around $600.<\/p>\n

\"Hero<\/a>
Hero Jr.’s Power\/Sense board, assembled by my dad in 1985<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

His sensors are pretty solid, even a few decades later. My sister and I had a game where we’d try to sneak past him but he usually caught us. He also has a Cowboys and Robots game where you shoot him in a darkened room with a flashlight and he tells you if he got you first. Fun times. Here’s his Security Guard feature with hilarious singing when you get caught. (You could literally hook him up to a transmitter that would actually summon the police, but we never did this.)<\/p>\n