Squishy Robot Hardware Does Well Under Pressure

December 8, 2021 by Sonya Vasquez 4 Comments

If your jealousy for Festo robots is festering, fret not! [mikey77] has shown us that, even without giant piggy banks, we can still construct some fantastic soft robotics projects with a 3D printer and a visit to the hardware store. To get started, simply step through the process with this 3D Printed Artificial Muscles: Erector Set project on Instructables.

In a nutshell, [mikey77] generously offers us a system for designing soft robots built around a base joint mechanism: the Omega Muscle. Fashioned after its namesake, this base unit contains an inflatable membrane that expands with pressure and works in tandem with another Omega Muscle to produce upward and downward angular movement. Each muscle also contains two endpoints to connect to a base, a gripper, or more Omega Muscles. Simply scale them as needed and stack them to produce a custom soft robot limb, or use the existing STLs to make an articulated soft gripper.

This project actually comes in two parts for robot brawns and brains. Not only does [mikey77] take us through the process for making Omega muscles, we also get a guide for building the pressure system designed to control them. Taken together, it’s a feature-complete setup for exploring your own soft robotics projects with a great starting project. Stay tuned after the break for a demo video in action. There’s no audio, but we’re sure you’ll be letting off an audible pssssh in satisfaction to follow along.

It’s not every day that we see FFF-based 3D printers making parts that need to be airtight. And [mikey77’s] success has us optimistic for seeing more air muscles in future projects down the road. In the meantime, have a look at the silicone-silicon half-breeds that we’ve previously caught pumping iron.

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A robot that detects whether you are awake and gently taps you if not.

Wake-Up Robot Does It Gently

December 3, 2021 by Kristina Panos 6 Comments

For hundreds of years, people have fallen asleep while reading in bed late at night. These days it’s worse, what with us taking phones to the face instead when we start to nod off. At least they don’t have pointy corners like books. While you may not want to share your bedroom with a robot, this wake-up robot by [Norbert Zare] may be just the thing to keep you awake.

Here’s how it works: a Raspberry Pi camera on a servo wanders around at eye level, and the Pi it’s attached to uses OpenCV to determine whether those eyes are open or starting to get heavy. The bot can also speak — it uses eSpeak to introduce itself as a bot designed not to let you sleep. Then when it catches you snoozing, it repeatedly intones ‘wake up’ in a bored British accent.

We were sure that the thing was designed to slap [Norbert] in the face a la [Simone Giertz]’s robot alarm clock, but no, that long-fingered hand just slowly swings down and gently taps [Norbert] on the arm (or whatever is in the path of the slappy hand). Check out the short demo and build video after the break.

Do you want to be awoken even more gently? Try a sunlight lamp. We’ve got dozens in stock, but this one gradually gets about as bright as the sun.

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It’s Nice Having Someone To Talk To

November 28, 2021 by Orlando Hoilett 6 Comments

We all get a bit lonely from time to time and talking to other humans can be a challenge. With social robots still finding their way these days, [Markus] decided to find a DIY solution he could make cheaply, resulting in the “Conversation Face.”

The build is actually pretty simple, really. You have three different OLED displays, two for the eyes and one for the mouth, that have different graphic images programmed onto them depending on the expression being displayed. There’s also a small electret microphone that senses when you are speaking to the face. Finally, a simple face cutout covers the electronics and solidifies the aesthetic.

The eyes are programmed identically since they would move together for most expressions. [Markus] was able to get a blinking animation by quickly moving a white circle vertically through the eye screens and the results are pretty convincing. He also moves the eyes around the OLED to make the expressions seem more dynamic.

There’s not much to the mouth. [Markus] only has a mouth open and a mouth closed animation. The mouth opens when it’s the face’s turn to talk or closes when the face should be listening. This information is easily determined by measuring the output of the microphone. Interestingly enough, you can program the face to be quiet and attentive when it’s being spoken to or quite chatty to show that it’s actively engaging in the conversation.

I don’t know about you, but we can’t decide if the Conversation Face is more or less creepy than those social robots. Either way, we thought you would get a kick out of it regardless. It also looks like a funny anime character if you ask us.

Light-Tracking BEAM Robot Can See The Light

November 21, 2021 by Lewin Day 14 Comments

BEAM robotics, which stands for Biology, Electronics, Aesthetics, and Mechanics, is an ethos that focuses on building robots with simple analog circuits. [NanoRobotGeek] built a great example of the form, creating a light-tracking robot that uses no batteries and no microcontrollers.

The robot aims to track the brightest source of light it can see. This is achieved by feeding signals from four photodiodes into some analog logic, which then spits out voltages to the two motors that aim the robot, guiding it towards the light. There’s also a sound-detection circuit, which prompts the robot to wiggle when it detects a whistle via an attached microphone.

The entire circuitry is free-formed using brass wire, and the result is an incredibly artful build. Displayed in a bell jar, the build looks like some delicate artifact blending the past and future. Neither steampunk nor cyberpunk, it draws from both with its combination of vintage brass and modern LEDs.

It’s a great build that reminds us of some of the great circuit sculptures we’ve seen lately. Video after the break.

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Bluetooth RC Car Packs In A Few Sensors

November 13, 2021 by Lewin Day 4 Comments

Have you ever been walking around the house, desperate to know the ambient temperature, humidity, and barometric pressure? Have you ever wanted to capture that data with a small remote-controlled platform? If so, this project from [TUENHIDIY] will be exactly what you’ve been looking for.

The little remote-control car is built around a Seeed Wio Terminal. This is a microcontroller platform that comes with a screen already attached, along with wireless hardware baked in and Grove connectors for hooking up external modules. Thus, the car adds a DHT11 temperature and humidity sensor, along with a BMP280 air pressure sensor using the Grove connectors.

Driving the car is done via a Blynk smartphone app that communicates with the Wio Terminal. Small DC motors at each wheel are driven via a DFRobot quad-motor shield. With the built-in screen, the RC car displays commands received from the smartphone app, as well as the temperature, humidity and pressure in the immediate environment.

We really like the simple PVC-based chassis design, and it’s a straightforward project that demonstrates how to build a Bluetooth-controlled car. Data collected by the sensors is also visible on the smartphone app, so if you need to sample conditions in the next room without getting off the couch, you could do that pretty easily.

Projects like these are a good way to get familiar with working with motors and sensors. It’d be a great base for simple robotics development, too. We’ve featured builds from [TUENHIDIY] before, too, like this great rotary plotter that can draw on bottles. Video after the break.

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Adding Brakes To Actuated Fingers

November 8, 2021 by Bryan Cockfield 10 Comments

Building exoskeletons for people is a rapidly growing branch of robotics. Whether it’s improving the natural abilities of humans with added strength or helping those with disabilities, the field has plenty of room for new inventions for the augmentation of humans. One of the latest comes to us from a team out of the University of Chicago who recently demonstrated a method of adding brakes to a robotic glove which gives impressive digital control (PDF warning).

The robotic glove is known as DextrEMS but doesn’t actually move the fingers itself. That is handled by a series of electrodes on the forearm which stimulate the finger muscles using Electrical Muscle Stimulation (EMS), hence the name. The problem with EMS for manipulating fingers is that the precision isn’t that great and it tends to cause oscillations. That’s where the glove comes in: each finger includes a series of ratcheting mechanisms that act as brakes which can position the fingers precisely enough to make intelligible signs in sign language or even play a guitar or piano.

For anyone interested in robotics or exoskeletons, the white paper is worth a read. Adding this level of precision to an exoskeleton that manipulates something as small as the fingers opens up a brave new world of robotics, but if you’re looking for something that operates on the scale of an entire human body, take a look at this full-size strength-multiplying exoskeleton that can help you lift superhuman amounts of weight.

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Battle Robot Uses Carbon Fiber To Save Weight

November 5, 2021 by Lewin Day 9 Comments

ZAP! The saw is capable of delivering high-voltage discharges to damage its foes.

Combat robots come in all shapes and sizes, with regulating authorities often using weight limits to create a level playing field for competitors. [Hans Jørgen Grimstad] is building a robot to compete in a 4 kg class, and made some interesting design decisions to that end.

4 kg is not a lot of weight to play with. When considering the motors needed to propel the robot and the batteries needed to run everything, there’s then precious little weight left for weapons systems and armor plating.

Thus, in an effort to make the most of the weight limitations, [Hans] decided to use carbon fiber for the robot’s outer shell. The method used is a simple wet layup in a mold. We’d be supremely interested to see how this armor holds up in competition, versus more typical choices like aluminium and steel.

Other interesting features include a belt-driven saw, which [Hans] tests with his hands mere inches away and the robot’s motors powered up. Don’t do this if you value your fingers. This is paired with a high-voltage discharge taser module. When the saw gets close to another robot, it may cause sparks to jump to the enemy, damaging its electronics in the process. It’s something we haven’t seen too often, as such measures are actually banned in some contests.

Diehard enthusiasts in the battle robot community will likely have fierce opinions on many points of the design; have it out in the comments. It’s certainly not the first carbon-fiber bot, but it’s nice to see the fancy material being thrown in the ring.

We’ve seen other designers innovate, too, such as this remarkably successful walking robot build. Video after the break.

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