Plotter Made Entirely From Lego


Check out this awesome tool that [Alfonso Martone] built and wrote in to tell us about: a pin plotter made entirely from Lego (except for the addition of a pin in one brick). [Alfonso] has managed to get 33dpi resolution with a “printable” area of 90x70mm. The NXT device reads 1bit bitmapped images in PBM format and outputs onto a sheet of paper, which is held in place by Lego pneumatics pushing against rubber Lego bricks. Output is not what you might call speedy, though: it takes 35-40 minutes to output a drawing with 1,500 holes.


[Alfonso] has managed to capture our hearts with this awesome piece of work, which we’d love to backlight and put in a frame on our wall.

[Thanks, Alfonso Martone]

14 thoughts on “Plotter Made Entirely From Lego

  1. You could buy a kit to do this that came with software for the BBC micro to do this. I borrowed the kit from a college and made it myself a few years ago. It wasn’t great but it worked.

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