Zombie [Jackson] Bot Dances To Thriller

December 31, 2011 by Mike Szczys 2 Comments

[Marc Cryan] built this little bugger which he calls Wendell the Robot. But what good is an animatronic piece like this unless you do something fun with it? That’s why you can catch the movements matching [Michael Jackson’s] choreography from the music video Thriller in the clip after the break.

This is a ground-up build for [Marc]. He started by designing templates for each of the wood parts using Inkscape. After printing them out, he glued each to a piece of 1/4″ plywood and cut along the lines using a band saw. We don’t have a lot of adhesive spray experience, but he mentions that the can should have directions for temporary adhesion so that the template can be removed after cutting.

During assembly he makes sure to add servo horns for easy connection when adding the motors. All together he’s using five; two for the wheels, two for the arms, and one for the neck. A protoboard shield makes it easy to connect them to the Arduino which is used as a controller.

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A Little Tweeting “Ewok”

December 27, 2011 by Jeremy Cook 22 Comments

Tweet Receiving, that is. This Ewok model, named “Ewen the Cheerlight,” is able to rotate its head left and right as well as show expressions. The most interesting feature of this hack, however, is that the little Ewok actually wakes up each time one tweets a “colour” to @cheerlights and lets it’s owner [Joel] know what he thinks of the “color” you’ve chosen. [Joel] insists that he’s like this featured on [HAD], although it remains to be seen if it will soon be turned off after the tweets start rolling in…

As far as how the device works, the head is turned with a simple hobby servo motor, and the expressions are shown on a LED matrix. The model itself is built from a polystyrene ball and an old table lamp. The build really looks awesome.

All of this is controlled by an Easy USB Interface Board which is listed on [Pozible], the Australian version of [Kickstarter]. Be sure to check out the video of “Ewen” in action after the break! Continue reading “A Little Tweeting “Ewok”” →

A Robot… That Can See Through Walls!

December 26, 2011 by Jeremy Cook 14 Comments

Robots on four wheels are fun on their own merits, but one thing that most lack is the ability to see through walls. With it’s onboard radar system, this bot is equipped to see objects that a person couldn’t normally detect on the other side of the wall.

Although some of the more “nuts and bolts” details of this build are missing, the robot uses an Ultra-Wideband Radar system called the [D1] Radar System. This system can, according to their documentation, “Avoid false positives caused by vapor, dust, smoke, rain or other small particles.” Apparently this means drywall as well if programmed correctly.

In the video after the break, the robot’s sensor package is programmed to ignore anything within 1.5 meters. This allows the robot to mirror the movement of the apparent shelving unit on the other side. This sensor could certainly have some interesting robotics applications besides imitating a rolling shelf, so we’re excited to see what it will be used for!

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Tribot Robotics Platform

December 19, 2011 by Brian Benchoff 5 Comments

For a number of children born of geek parents, the WowWee Tribot is sure to make an appearance underneath a Christmas tree this year. By New Year’s, though, this toy will surely make its way to the back of a closet to sit unused until spring cleaning. It’s a shame to let such an interesting robotics platform go to waste, so [haltux] sent in a nice guide to unlocking the motor controller of this talking robot.

The ‘legs’ of the WowWee Tribot have three omnidirectional wheels mounted 120 degrees apart. We’ve seen this drive system before, so getting a pre-built platform out of the toy box is pretty interesting.

[haltux] found three H-bridges inside the Tribot and connected the direction and enable pins for each motor directly to an Arduino. The build was a success, and the new robot platform scurried along the floor. There are also rotary encoders on the Tribot, but these run at 12 Volts. [haltux] said he’ll cover these in a future post, and we’re waiting to see it.

Build Your Own Miniature Self Parking Car

December 15, 2011 by Mike Nathan 6 Comments

self-park

[Achu Wilson] was watching TV when he saw an ad for Volkswagen’s latest Passat, which happens to come equipped with a park assist mode. This essentially allows the car to park itself with little to no user interaction. While these systems come as a pricey add-on option, he figured he could build something similar in his own home, albeit on a much smaller scale.

Digging through his parts bin he only came across a single infrared proximity sensor, so instead of building vehicle that could parallel park, he settled on constructing one that can situate itself in a traditional parking spot instead. The car is built from wood and a pair of DC motors [Achu] had on hand, both of which are controlled using an ATmega16.

As a proof of concept, it looks to work pretty well despite the fact that it only has a single fixed sensor navigate its surroundings. We imagine it would be a relatively easy task to adapt the system for parallel parking, among other things.

Continue reading to see [Achu’s] self-parking car in action.

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Android Legs Stability Testing

December 13, 2011 by Mike Szczys 9 Comments

This is [James’] latest android build, a set of legs that use gyroscopes for balance.

He started off by planning the build with some LEGO pieces to get an idea of how each foot and leg joint would fit together. This let him achieve one of his goals. From the start he wanted to create a robot that would remain stable, and not build up enough momentum to tip itself over if there is a problem. With the dimensions established he cut out parts from 2mm sheets of HIP plastic using a hobby knife. They work in conjunction with a frame made from aluminum and HDPE. The whole thing houses eight servos responsible for movement, but he found an interesting way to use them for balance as well.

[James] came across some gyroscopic sensors which are made for use with RC helicopters. They connect in-line with a servo motor and offset it based on the gyro data. He’s using four of them with this bot, playing the hip and ankle servos against each other for balance. What results is a set of legs that look like their jonesin’ for a fix. See for yourself in the clip after the break.

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Sphere Morphing Hexabot Is A Mechanical Jellyfish

December 12, 2011 by Brian Benchoff 35 Comments

Once again, we’re wowed over [Zenta]’s robotic skill. A few months ago, [Zenta] posted a video of his MorpHex hexapod spherebot that left us awed. After a few long months, more bits of MorpHex have made it onto the chassis. [Zenta] says his project isn’t done but it’s still enough to knock our socks off.

Going through the [Zenta] archives, there’s a little more to go on this time around. The MorpHex will be made up of two hemispheres, but only the bottom one will be able to walk. That’s really not that bad because [Zenta] gave the upper panels 1 degree of freedom. Just enough to scare off predators, we’re sure.

The chassis and the legs are amazing little pieces of engineering. Despite all the work [Zenta] has put into his MorpHex, there’s still work to be done. He hasn’t gotten the sphere to roll on command yet. We’ll be sure to post a video of the robot dancing to some lo-fi. Check that out after the jump.

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