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An Illustrated Introduction to Robotics Engineering: A Beginner's Guide to Mechanisms, Sensors, and Control Systems
Paperback
Series: The Ashworth Engineering Library
Publisher: Independently Published
Published: Aug 3 2026
Pages: 266
Weight: 1.37
Height: 0.56 Width: 8.50 Depth: 11.00
Language: English
EVERY ROBOT IS FOUR SUBJECTS PRETENDING TO BE ONE. NOBODY EVER SHOWS YOU WHERE THEY CONNECT.
You can name a servo, a PID loop, a Jacobian. So why does robotics still feel like a pile of parts that never becomes a machine?
THE PROBLEM ISN'T YOU. IT'S HOW ROBOTICS IS TAUGHT.
Mechanics in one book. Control theory in another. Vision, kinematics, ROS, and machine learning each sealed in its own silo, each quietly assuming you mastered the rest. Beginners drown in equations with no picture attached. Makers build robots they cannot debug. Students memorize formulas they cannot connect. Same ending every time: a full shelf, and still no working model of how a machine senses, decides, and moves.
ONE BOOK. ONE CHAIN OF REASONING. FIFTEEN CHAPTERS THAT ACTUALLY BUILD.
This book teaches robotics the way it is practiced: as one connected discipline. Kinematics feeds dynamics. Dynamics drives motor selection. Sensing and control close the loop. The Jacobian you meet in Chapter 4 comes back in Chapters 5, 8, 9, and 10 used, not merely repeated.
WHAT'S INSIDE
- 168 illustrations and diagrams that turn abstract math into something you can see
- 87 fully worked examples with complete, checkable arithmetic and no skipped steps
- 15 practice sets with full answer keys, one per chapter
- Geometry and motion: rotation matrices, quaternions, Denavit-Hartenberg parameters, forward and inverse kinematics, singularities, workspace analysis
- Force and hardware: Newton-Euler and Lagrangian dynamics, four-bar linkages, material selection, DC/stepper/BLDC motors, torque-speed curves, gear reduction
- Sensing and control: encoders, IMUs, force sensing, LiDAR, stereo vision, PID tuning, A* and RRT path planning, SLAM
- Systems and safety: ROS nodes and URDF, battery chemistry, power budgeting, reinforcement learning, sim-to-real transfer, ISO 10218 collaborative safety
- Learning objectives, key-term boxes, summaries, glossary, and index
WHAT CHANGES WHEN YOU FINISH
- Look at any robot and name its six subsystems and how they interact
- Compute where an arm's gripper is, and which joint angles reach a target
- Size a motor, budget a battery, and tune a control loop with real numbers
- Read robotics papers, datasheets, and job listings without getting lost
- Stop memorizing robotics and start engineering it
WHO THIS BOOK IS FOR
- Engineering students meeting robotics for the first time
- Makers and hobbyists who build robots but want the theory underneath
- Career changers moving into robotics, automation, or mechatronics
- Software and IT professionals crossing into physical systems
- Practicing engineers and instructors who want one unified treatment
No robotics background needed. Algebra and trigonometry get you started; the calculus in the dynamics chapters is introduced as it is used.
STOP COLLECTING FRAGMENTS. BUILD THE WHOLE PICTURE.
Click Buy Now and start Chapter 1 today.
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