Roboceratops: A Robot Dinosaur That Defies Extinction

July 19, 2014 by Kristina Panos 13 Comments

Inspired by a childhood love of dinosaurs, [Robert] set out to build a robotic dinosaur from the Ceratopsian family. After about a year of design, building, and coding, he has sent us a video of Roboceratops moving around gracefully, chomping a rope, and smoothly wagging his tail.

Roboceratops is made from laser-cut MDF and aluminium bars in the legs. That’s not cookie dough on those legs, it’s upholstery foam, and we love the way [Robert] has shaped it. Roboceratops has servos in his jaw, neck, tail, and legs for a total of 14-DOF. You can see the servo specifics and more in the video description. [Robert] has full kinematic control of him through a custom controller and is working to achieve total quadrupedal locomotion.

Inside that custom controller is an Arduino Mega 2560, an LCD, and two 3-axis analog joysticks that control translation, height, yaw, pitch, and jaw articulation. For now, Roboceratops receives power and serial control through a tether, but [Robert] plans to add an on-board µC for autonomous movement as well as wireless, a battery, an IMU, and perhaps some pressure/contact detection in his feet.

The cherry on top of this build is the matching, latching custom carry case that has drawers to hold the controller, power supply, cable, tools, and spare parts. Check out Roboceratops after the break.

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Marvin’s Marvelous Mechanical Museum

July 17, 2014 by Mike Szczys 9 Comments

Don’t call it an arcade. There are arcade-like things about it… like dance-based video games, Skee-ball, and tickets — oh so many tickets. But Marvin’s Marvelous Mechanical Museum is a one-of-a-kind that you need to visit next time you’re in the North suburbs of Detroit, Michigan.

[Marvin] was there in person, as he is many days. He talked with us for a few minutes and we’ve folded his interview, along with footage of many of the attractions, into the video above.

He’s been collecting for more than three decades. The attractions are packed into every bit of floor space, spilling up onto the walls, and hanging from every spot in the ceiling. There are true antiques from both home and abroad that could be referred to as automatons, rows of fortune tellers, a track of large airplane models that make a loop around the establishment when fed a quarter, and much more.

Some of the attractions were build for him, like the robot band you can make out behind [Marvin] during the interview. It is a MIDI-based build that allows songs to be selected from a touchscreen. Soon to be on exhibit is a Tesla-coil-based offering which [Marvin] commissioned after taking second place to [Nicolai Tesla] on a list of oddest museums.

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Self-Balancing Robot Uses Android And Lego NXT

July 16, 2014 by James Hobson 21 Comments

LEGO NXT + Android = Self Balancing Robot

Self-balancing robots are pretty cool, but sometimes a bit too complex to make. [HippoDevices] shows us that it’s really not that hard, and you can even do it with Lego NXT and an Android device!

First step is to build your two-wheeled robot – go nuts! As long as the Lego NXT motors are strong enough you’ll be able to make most different shaped robots easy to balance. You’re going to need an Android ADK board to provide communication between the Lego motors and your Android device. [HippoDevices] is using their own design, called the Hippo-ADK which is on Kickstarter currently.

This allows your Android device to read the status and control the Lego Motors — from there it’s just a matter of programming it to balance according to the device’s gyroscope.

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Project Sentinel — A Bipedal Walking Robot

July 6, 2014 by James Hobson 30 Comments

Bipedal-Walking-Sentinel-Project-500x375

[Ye Guan] has always been fascinated by walking robots — so he decided to build his own. It’s called Project Sentinel, and he’s loosely based the design off of the Sentinel Walker from Warhammer 40K, and the two-legged AT-AT walker from Star Wars.

Both of these robots are based off of a bird’s walking style. Scientifically this is called the digitgrade walking style, which means they stand and walk on their digits (toes) — this typically allows them to move more quickly and quietly than most other animals.

[Ye] has managed to achieve this for his project using 8 servo motors, balancing the center of mass directly above the feet. Think about it like a reverse pendulum, which is supported by the servos torque and balanced by a gyroscope. He plans to have it fully autonomous with sensor feedback.

It’s not done yet, but he’s already released all the CAD files and a nice build log for anyone to attempt it themselves — we’re excited to see the final product. Just take a look at it walking in place after the break!

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Seven story robot juggles three VW Beetles

Step Right Up Or Cower In Fear; The 7-Story Car-Juggling Robot Is Here

July 1, 2014 by Kristina Panos 73 Comments

Sometimes we see a project that’s just as frightening as it is awesome. The Bug Juggler is a prime example of this phenomenon. A seven-story diesel-powered humanoid robot is one thing, but this one will pick up two VW Beetles, put one in its pocket, pick up a third, and juggle them. Yes, juggle them.

The Bug Juggler will be driven by a brave soul sitting in the head-cage and controlling him through haptic feedback connected to high-speed servo valves. A diesel engine will generate hydraulic pressure, and the mobility required for juggling the cars will come from hydraulic accumulators.

The project is in the capable hands of team members who have built special effects, a diesel/hydraulic vehicle for hauling huge sections of pipe, and mechanisms for Space Shuttle experiments. In order to attract investors for the full-scale version, they are building an 8-foot tall proof-of-concept arm assembly capable of tossing and catching a 250lb. mass.

If you prefer to see Beetles crushed, check out Stompy, the 18-foot rideable hexapod. Make the jump to see an animation of the full-scale Bug Juggler in action. Don’t know about you, but we wouldn’t stand quite so close to it without a helmet and some really good health insurance.

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Stubby, The Adorable And Easy To Build Hexapod

June 30, 2014 by Brian Benchoff 23 Comments

stubby

A while back, we had a sci-fi contest on Hackaday.io. Inspired by the replicators in Stargate SG-1, [The Big One] and a few other folk decided a remote-controlled hexapod would be a great build. The contest is long over, but that doesn’t mean development stopped. Now Stubby, the replicator-inspired hexapod is complete and he looks awesome.

The first two versions suffered from underpowered servos and complex mechanics. Third time’s the charm, and version three is a lightweight robot with pretty simple mechanics able to translate and rotate along the XYZ axes. Stubby only weights about 600 grams, batteries included, so he’s surprisingly nimble as well.

The frame of the hexapod is designed to be cut with a scroll saw, much to the chagrin of anyone without a CNC machine. There are three 9g servos per leg, all controlled with a custom board featuring an ATMega1284p and an XBee interface to an old Playstation controller.

Video of Stubby below, and of course all the sources and files are available on the project site.

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