CNC ping pong printer uses simple construction

spherebot

This is one of the simplest CNC builds we’ve seen but it still functions quite well. It’s a clone of the EggBot, but is aimed at printing on spherical Ping Pong balls rather than oblong eggs. [Chad] calls it the Spherebot, but you should be careful not to confuse it with the morphing sphere robot which can walk around like a hexapod.

The project is both mechanically and electronically simple. The body of the printer is made up of three acrylic plates, which we’re sure were clamped together when drilling holes to guarantee proper alignment. Threaded rod and nuts are used to mount the plates to one another, as well as to hold the sphere in place while printing. One stepper motor turns the ball while the other pivots the pen mount. A servo motor is responsible for lifting the pen. The entire thing is driven by an Arduino along with two stepper motor driver boards. Don’t miss [Chad's] presentation embedded after the break.

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Mug Plotter based on the Eggbot

mug-plotter

Here’s a fun way to break up the monotony in the old cubicle farm. The Mug Plotter will let you expertly inscribe your coffee vessel with a different witty saying or design for each day of the week. If it looks familiar that’s because it’s loosely based on the non-flat drawing robot, the Eggbot.

[Teed] built the machine using laser cut plywood parts. He starts off the build description with the griping technique. There are two parts to this, one is concave and fits in the mouth of the mug. The convex side grips the bottom edges of it. These parts go on the frame along with the slide and thread rods which hold the stylus. A servo motor is along for the ride, providing the ability to lift the marker when necessary.

You can see in the clip after the break that there’s a bit of oscillation in the rig when one of the steppers starts turning really fast. But it doesn’t seem to affect the look of the design very much at all.

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