The Raspberry Turk Is a Pi-Powered, Open Source Robot That Can Play Chess

While many hacks we see today are based on “retro” technology, this generally means the early 1980s, or perhaps the ‘50s. This one, however, comes to us from the ‘70s, the 1770s that is, when Wolfgang von Kempelen introduced his “Turk” a mechanical chess playing “robot.” Though this device was later found to actually have a human inside, it remains a legendary mechanism.

After reading about this “retro-tech,” Joey Meyer decided to create his own version. His Turk uses a Raspberry Pi to control a Selective Compliance Articulated Robot Arm (SCARA) to move pieces across the board using an electromagnet as a gripper.

A Pi Camera is used to recognize the pieces on the board, and utilizes an open source chess engine called Stockfish to compete against a human player.

You can see Meyer’s impressive project in action below, and check it out here.