Robotic sentry gun

posted Sep 21st 2005 9:30am by
filed under: robots hacks

sentry gun

Reader [aaron rasmussen] and his brother Ezra built this awesome robotic sentry gun. The gun is an airsoft replica of an FN P90 and fires 6mm BBs. Pan and tilt are controlled by two hobby servos using a simple controller. Aaron wrote custom software to watch the usb webcam and track targets. There is a video on the site of it being tested



70 Responses to Robotic sentry gun

  • Arasoi says:

    Now that is a cool idea :)

  • Injulen says:

    Wow. Sci-Fi stuff is coming to life! I like this project.

  • duffman3030 says:

    i built something similar but with a real pistol. but it had too much recoil for the tripod top, was largely inacurate, could only fire once(tripod/aiming mechansm broke after first shot). plus a friend of mine who is a cop informed me that such a device was illegal since it was considered a booby trap. i hate america. illegal to defend your hame and well being. what a worthless country.

  • Loquax says:

    duffman3030, Worthless people make a worthless country, and with people like you around we’ll soon be worthless. Get a damn clue. I’m a gun owner and a proud American. Your only complaint should be that you are too inept at convincing other voters to see things your way through legal means (no LSD in the drinking water). Go jump out of black helicopter loser.

  • zen says:

    loquax, get a grip. You’re the one coming across like a nut. Instead of calling someone else a loser, why don’t you examine your own life? Proud American, indeed.

  • Loquax says:

    If you’ve ever lost anyone close in defense of this country you’d understand.

  • joejack says:

    That thing would be a beast if you put a real airsoft gun on there! Maybe an upgraded armalite with an autowinding drum.

    Airsoft Hacks equal coolness. Check out http://www.unconventional-airsoft.com/projects.php
    for some more, including a simpler motion sensing turret.

  • bird603568 says:

    I totally see loquax’s point. But this would be sweet in paint ball. But you would have to put a paintball gun not an airsoft gun and you would need the rage finder and possible a wind speed detector.

  • Loquax says:

    Sorry I went off guys. After looking at this thing it would also be sweet to combine this with the IR Camera hack and have an adaptable camera lense (or lenses) to allow this thing to work at night. This would make a great paintball mod.

  • Joel says:

    handbags away, lady’s

  • duffman3030 says:

    im sorry to have offended you loquax. its just that while me and my mom were at the hospital visiting my dad our house got robbed. so i built a little defense system and then found out that it was illegal. furthermore, a friend of a friend got stabbed multiple times by some guy who he then shot(in self defense). this friend of a friend then went to jail for carrying a concealed weapon. (the only reason he had it was because he had been attacked before). now you cant say that that is fucked up. that is why i hate this country, because of the laws that always punish the victim more than the purpetrator.
    that having been said the only reason i have yet to enlist in the military is because while i dont mind dying i do mind having my arms and legs blown off and then being discharged. what would i do then? so im getting a college degree then joining so thaif im discharged due to injury or i get riffed then i mont be SOL!

  • cooooooooooooooooooooooooooooool, now how’s about this with a gaus gun, and make multiple sentries that all work from different angles but from one camera, or maybe multiple cams? O_O

  • Sleighboy says:

    “The idea of this project was to create a fully-automated sentry gun, capable of picking out a human target and accurately tracking and shooting him or her in the heart”

    haha, just shooting them was not good enough, it had to be a heart shot.

  • el payo says:

    HUDSON: We’re all gonna die, man. We’re doomed. Game over.

    RIPLEY: These boys built a sentry gun with no training, and no funding from Homeland Security.

    HUDSON: (whining) Why don’t we put them in charge, then.

  • Douglas J. Hickok says:

    Sounds like something I did a while back: http://www.cs.uwec.edu/mics/CD%20image/papers/paper6.pdf

    Great job though! Yours probably works better than ours did! (and it looks better too)

  • Johnny says:

    Wow, that was my favorite gun in Goldeneye 007 on the Nintendo 64.

    That thing has an pretty impressive tracking speed and firing rate.

  • SomeCat says:

    This is badass. A real Weapon with this running XP (or Linux or OS X for that matter)is a nightmare. Can you imagine a REAL blue screen of death? But,this setup with a paintball gun filled with pepper spray balls could be a viable home defense option that won’t kill you or your family if it malfunction’s. Oh and that MAY be legal (I don’t know)

  • Modul8 says:

    NIce work on the robotics and tracking software. I can’t say I care for the application. There are already too many firearms on the planet(whether they are for ‘self protection’ or otherwise.)Nobody’s property is worth taking a life for. How can you ensure that such an automated weapon is protecting life? I regret that many of the wrong people will read this and build something really stupid. and possibly get hurt/killed doing so. Lets keep it fun kids.. stick to spud guns.

  • Aaron brown says:

    I’m thinking it needs an IFF system. Something based on RFID, maybe? Tag friendlies with an RFID tag, set it up to only fire on targets within a certain range (inside the range of the tags) that don’t emit a “friendly” frequency?

    Sound plausible to anyone else?

  • I daresay a spud gun can do a hella lot more damage than an airsoft gun.

    I would comment more, but I have a distinct feeling discussion here could degenerate to a 2nd Amendments flamefest if we aren’t careful. :P

  • amaspri@yahoo.com says:

    I just gotta say that just looks darn right awesome. Way to go. Great job.

  • Wow, thanks for all of the support. I’ve gotten such a huge response, I’ll try to put up an FAQ soon. I really appreciated the links to similar projects, especially the paintball version. I definitely considered a paintball version, but the recoil would be really tough on my rather light servos.

  • Brandon says:

    that’s my roomie!

  • Eric says:

    Very cool… but you better add a “mailman” filter.

  • Pyrrho says:

    Nice job. Remember, though… hen robotic sentry guns are criminalized, only criminals will have robotic sentry guns…

  • pretorious says:

    looks like we got slashdoted

  • Sirus says:

    Can I get a copy of the software? or maybe even the source code I have two airsoft guns and such a nosey brother that I have barbed wire where my door nob should be, hardly slows him down.

  • Welcome Slashdotters. We’ve got another good story lined up for tomorrow. (Not as much pain though)

  • Imagine a beowulf cluster….

    Actually, a live streaming feed with the option of “Perferate? y/n” would be helpful.

  • Joe says:

    You shouldn’t have much of a problem with a painball version if you wanted to go that route. Paintball guns don’t have much recoil if any at all, due to the fact that the projectile they fire doesn’t carry near the amount of energy that I firearm produces (even one as small as a .22) and doesn’t really move the gun around much. Recoil can always be controlled by adding weight. However, a paintball gun with a fully loaded tank of CO2 may be a bit heavy for your servos to move around effectively. By the way, I would love to see the sourcecode to the software you designed around this application, that is if you are willing to reveal it.

  • Nic says:

    I’l take a dozen, thanks :)

  • Joe says:

    You shouldn’t have much of a problem with a painball version if you wanted to go that route. Paintball guns don’t have much recoil if any at all, due to the fact that the projectile they fire doesn’t carry near the amount of energy that I firearm produces (even one as small as a .22) and doesn’t really move the gun around much. Recoil can always be controlled by adding weight. However, a paintball gun with a fully loaded tank of CO2 may be a bit heavy for your servos to move around effectively. By the way, I would love to see the sourcecode to the software you designed around this application, that is if you are willing to reveal it.

  • evan says:

    Yes, please consider releasing the source code. Inquisitive University students want to learn!

  • crash says:

    haha what happens when a IR illuminator is thrown into the mix of things (aimes @ the camera)

  • Mutant says:

    Fuck the police. And you self-richous morons who never served a day in your lives. As for those serving I can safely say they are not laying it all on the line so some fat ass-hole/buracrate can dictate how you should live.

    All that aside. Yea…. America sucks!

  • viablehomedefense says:

    Viable home defense? Until your 5 year old daughter wanders downstairs in the middle of the night for some water and is shot (in the heart, and you’re too blame..you give home defense a bad name).

    Oooo yeah, not only a gun in your house, but an indiscriminatory one. Anyone ever see Robocop? The beginning scene with ED-209…awesome!

  • Matthew m says:

    This looks a lot like a company that was operating in Texas.. http://www.live-shot.com

  • roger m jay says:

    Be thankfull you do not live in England ( or U.K. if you know us by that ) This pinko government is trying to ban anything that even looks like a gun to a blind person.

  • scottennis says:

    I think it would be legal and palatable to anti-gun people if it shot a stream of indelible ink and then automatically dialed 911.
    That would also prevent it from blowing itself off its stand with a real gun, too.

  • Ken says:

    Would be nice for our boys in Iraq to have somthing like this.

  • rainrider says:

    The thing about home defense that seems to always be forgotten: you don’t have to outrun the bear. That is, say you are a burglar are going to rob someone. You have the choice between house A, that has a BMW out front with a Kerry 2004 sticker on it or house B with a pickup truck and or motorcycle, some bumper stickers denoting devotion to the 2nd Amendment, NRA, your favorite firearm company, favorite shooting sport, Libertarian Party, and/or U.S. Marine Corps and….THIS baby, fully tracking the movements of anyone who enters the yard with intent, implied malice. I submit that most thieves will choose house A. I really like the indelible ink idea, but even simply the idea of a gun-looking device that “watches” you enter someone’s property has a high deterrent factor even with no projectiles at all. Who’s to say the anthropomorphic thing is not taking pictures or dialing the cops/local mafia or a million other things? Very cool and well done gentlemen, I would very much like to see some source code if we may.

  • roger m jay says:

    In England, the police shot dead a guy carrying a chair leg in a brown paper bag, no warning, just shot him, Americans, keep your firearms, ‘big government’ is after you!

  • stone says:

    Sourcecode!!!
    This a seriously cool project and i would injoy making a variant of it (without the gun/ any weapon)
    Just a laser that follows you around, ive been searching the net for sourcecode for motion detection but cant find squat.

  • In Soviet Russia anyone who had a personal sentry gun would be forced to drink New Orleans flood water. This is why any proud American would gladly don his brownshirt to place one in each tolietry box he sends to the relief effort.

  • Mrt says:

    http://www.people.cornell.edu/pages/jc476/340project.html – this goon made a robotic airhockey partner using the same principle, I can’t remember if he divulges his source code though.

  • somebody says:

    hi,
    guns are good&defencive toooo….
    but its 2 dangerous to play with it..

  • modul8: a burglary may not be worth taking a life for, but how about someone who would kill (to dispose of witnesses) and/or rape your kids? And how do you know ahead of time what this burglar’s going to be like? “Please fill in this survey before forcing entry: (1) are you a crazed killer (Y/N)?”

    vhd: the ed-209 comment is right on the mark. It’s why I would never automate anything lethal. But I’d have no problems with something like indelible paintballs. If it’s accurate enough to do heart shots, maybe it can colour-code the intruder? “What have we here? Red, Purple, Black; hmmm, that would be the burglary from 19 Elm Street last night.”

  • rainrider: with a laser and a lens, you could draw a cross-hair. THAT would be disconcerting. (-:

  • David C says:

    I’d be willing to pay for the source code also. I always wanted to do something like this but I have no idea how to any programming.

    David c

  • JSlice says:

    in response to the link of the “real deal” that works with a real gun.


    Communications can be established in a direct link or wirelessly, incorporating anti-jamming, encryption, or low probability of intercept/low probability of detection (LPI/LPD) methods. ”

    havnt they learned yet that anything wireless will and can be hacked?

    come-on…

  • mark coelho says:

    All it takes is one loon with the source code to place a real auto-turret on a city block or the like. Personally I would like to avoid any responsibility for that, and understand why he may be hesitant to release source code.
    I would also have to agree with those intrested merely in recreational use or a sentry as a deterent. Other than tracking, such a turret could also turn on lights around or inside the house, and if you really want to do damage, activate the sprinkler system (or a hose cannon) while the suspect is on the lawn. Firearms are far to dangerous for this system, and airsoft is dangerous with little kids around.
    An improvement if you’re not going for a very mobile system would be to use several satelite cameras, allowing the gun to calibrate its-self, track multiple targets outside its view/range, judge distances to targets, and make it capable of continued operation should it be hit by paintballs. (Place paint grenade booby traps on the other cameras to prevent sabatoge). The same 3 or more cameras could also provide the guidence for lots of sentries, assuming you want them to fire in the same region. eg. protecting a fort or clearing.

  • Inspector_71 says:

    “All it takes is one loon with the source code to place a real auto-turret on a city block or the like.” – mark coelho

    Highly doubtful. The amount of recoil a real rifle has means you’d need a seriously heavy and reinforced base. It wouldn’t be something you could just jump out of your car with, plop down and scurry away from.

  • shawn524 says:

    I really hope to see one of these things in blueprint form, or all out production. Where do i sign up?

  • Steve Peters says:

    To the guy who’s angry that he can’t setup a real lethal sentry gun in his house for self defense. What happens if you are not home, and your coffeemaker malfunctions and starts a fire in the kitchen and your sentry gun shoots the firefighters as they come in your house? Or, your mom has a stroke on the second floor & calls 911 and your system shoots the EMT’s. There are perfectly good reasons why you want to stay away from these kinds of systems. The best device for home security is… a dog that barks!

    Not to say that the sentry gun isn’t way cool, cuz it is.

  • mark coelho says:

    I didn’t mean they’d just stick it there and run. if it were disguised (a hotdog stand? :)) or placed on a building’s terrace, it could be quite potent and dangerous.
    anyway it looks like he’s now building a marketable version, so we’ll have a propietary toy version to get our hands on instead of source code. this seems far more reasonable, as it funds his research and restricts use of his design. (you could always develop your own givin the concepts) There are some paintball based ones already out there (google ‘em) but their sites are nowhere near as complete, and the look heavy (appear to be heavy gauge, 2in square stuctural steel)

  • Chasbo says:

    I don’t think that it is necessary to make this with a real gun to be an effective anti burglar device. The fail -unsafe options described above pretty much cover all the good reasons not to use real guns.However, burglars getting hit with multiple airsoft BBs or paintballs whilst sneaking around in the dark of your house would most likely flee rather than proceed with their crime or move closer to the source of pain (which would be hard to judge in the dark of course). Also, sensations felt in the absence of other senses are usually felt more acutely. So the pain and shock would feel much more than the reality. Attach a flash gun and you’ll not only get an ID of your intruder but also a very funny pic of them to share with your neighbours.

  • Paul Gibson says:

    I use to make remote sentry,s that would kill and did so it was the only friend one really has in warfare. This the gun lacks a remote heart sensor I did not catch his detector but one must turn off the gun after it has killed the target or you may throw away thirty thousand rounds of amonition on a deade corps. But it scares the hell out of your advisary to see one that mean to shoot him that many times.

  • Paul Gibson says:

    Also laser sentry,s as copied on star wars I did the first one. It was a chemical combustion laser with target recognition and acquistion of target. It was put into a five gallon can people loved it in some places because of jesus frog clones where crawling out of there holy holes and butchering any human it could get its tazer on. But most of the cans where rusty buckets. To fix it up and make it shine would bring on kleptominacs. The R2D2 was fix spiff up for the orginal Star Wars movie film in real battle not stage back in 1966 NOT by lucaus. Having two or three R2D2 sentries as documented in the film of a real attack by real clones out on the desert was neat and wipe out about 3 million advancing clones as seen in the original movies. One sentry might use the other sentry,s detection and race a laser beam infor the kill it was so violent seeing the sentry,s compete with each other to make a kill it was frightening.

  • Colin says:

    Anyone know if the site is cached somewhere or have you saved it?

  • rename says:

    yeah the link is gone it redirect to usmechatronics.com. if someone can share cached version please do.

  • panzerrat says:

    I live in Fascist Australia & I’m a WWII German Reenactor our problem is a paraniod .Gov, mounting a paintball,Airsoft or BB onto something like this would be totally unacceptable, not to mention the fact that Full & Semi Auto ANYTHINGS are illegal, so I came up with an idea to use a Dummy MG mounted on a tripod, powered by an Auto Windscreen Washer motor & CD Sound System with MG Fire, shoved into a sandbagged bunker it does the job, but it sucks in some ways, namely the fact that the Dummy MG has a wide swinning Arc & it rarely points at someone while making the “Simulated” MG sound, the ability for the unit to track targets would be awesome, anyone figured out software for this type of system?

  • Where can I get one, or how can I make one? Do you have instructions?

  • Embepsise says:

    Is that a new way? I want make the best use of my depth deputy Wanna very nice joke?)) What did the big chimney say to the small chimney? You’re too young to be smoking.

  • Sniper Man says:

    They do have a build your own paintball turret its pretty pricy but not tath bad for $500-1000

    http://inventgeek.com/Projects/paintball-turret/Overview.aspx

  • at last the information i needed thank you.

  • Robotsteve says:

    This looks like the real deal. Pricey but very cool!!
    http://www.evolutionmodeltechnology.ca/Paintball%20Turrets.html

    And check this out!! You can still chase people too. lol
    http://www.evolutionmodeltechnology.ca/sec1.html

  • Leave a Reply

    XHTML: You can use these tags: <a href="" title="" rel=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <pre> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <strike> <strong>

    Hack a Day serves up fresh hacks each day, every day from around the web as well as hacking related news.

    Send us your hacks










         




    Hacks

    Resources