While building a big project, it's good to celebrate milestones when they roll around. Here's a picture taken back when the team first assembled all the major pieces necessary for our SGVHAK rover to stand on its own wheels.

Rover on Wheels

It was cause for celebration even though there were still a lot of work to do: the wheels in the picture aren't solidly attached yet. Posing for this picture required some careful handling to make sure they don't fall off. The main body is basically just an empty bracket barely holding the two side assemblies together. Those two rocker-bogie assemblies still need the cross arm to connect them in order to create desired rover suspension kinematics. None of the electrical connections have been made - the wheels can't roll on their own power nor steer. Even if they could, the software isn't ready to drive them, either.

And we haven't even looked at the LED display for the friendly face of the robot.

But even with wires dangling, it doesn't look half bad. This was a pretty good morale boost for the team to see a recognizable shape coming together.