How To Build A Competitive Battle Robot

May 18, 2012 by Mike Szczys 10 Comments

Ever wonder what’s under the hood with a competitive battle robot like this one? It’s usually a big secret as teams don’t care to give their competition any help. But [AlexHrn] decided not only to give us a peek, but also shows us his step-by-step build process for Phoenix, the 30 pound flipping battle robot.

[Alex] has already seen quite a bit of success with a different robot, but he couldn’t quite beat another competitor whose bot included a flipping arm which threw its competition across the ring. So [Alex] decided to join in on the technique with this build. The arm itself uses air pressure to exert a large force very quickly. Inside, a paintball gun tank powers the pneumatic ram. It looks like this tank is charged up before the competition and only gets about 12 shots before it’s depleted. You can see the power in the quick clip after the break.

For locomotion the unit uses a couple of cordless drill motors. These have a fairly high RPM and work well when powered by batteries.

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Old Timey UAV Cameras

April 2, 2012 by Mike Szczys 15 Comments

These brave birds are weapons of war. Well, not these actual birds… they’re just models used for this photograph courtesy of a taxidermist. But their living relatives were used to take spy photographs during World War I. [Dr. Julius Neurbronner] didn’t suddenly jump into the field of avian photography. He, like his father before him, used homing pigeons to deliver prescription drugs in loads of up to 75 grams. This makes us wonder if the birds are ever used in modern drug running?

The inspiration came when the doctor found out about subminiature cameras available at the turn of the twentieth century. Those cameras included a tiny roll of film, allowing for several images to be taken. He figured out a way to make a timer that used a pneumatic system to trigger the shutter in the camera. You can see a diagram of the timer mechanism here. The idea is that the birds will always be able to find their way home. So if you take them to a starting point that puts the enemy lines in between them and home base, they’ll fly over and get some juicy recon in the process.

That’s pretty old school. But we’re still tying things onto birds these days. Here’s some modern tech that uses sun-up/sun-down to track travel habits.

[Thanks F via The Atlantic]

A Full Auto PVC Battery Gun

March 18, 2012 by Jeremy Cook 41 Comments

So what’s better than a battery gun? A full auto pneumatic battery gun of course! [ukilliheal], decided to build one of these, and show us the results in his video after the break. After turning the gun on, this contraption shoots at a pretty impressive rate of fire (although, apparently not as fast as some of his other experiments). Apparently batteries can do a pretty fair amount of damage to a cardboard target as shown around 1:20. [ukilliheal] apparently thinks this is pretty hilarious, but we wouldn’t want to be on the other end of this device!

Although details on this build are fairly slim in this video, [ukilliheal’s] other videos should provide some clues, especially those where he explains how to make a full auto paintball gun. If the same technique is used, a piston reloads the chamber using a homemade valve that releases pressure when it gets too high. Electronics could also be used, but keeping everything mechanical will allow for the batteries to be used solely as ammuntion.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A6Gs2mKNjV0%5D

If full-auto guns aren’t your thing, why not check out this bolt-action miniature pneumatic spud gun!

Star Trek Style Pneumatic Doors That Don’t Require A Stagehand

November 27, 2011 by Brian Benchoff 63 Comments

In 1966, [Gene Roddenberry] introduced fully manual doors powered by a stagehand on Star Trek. The fwoosh sound of the door was later dubbed into each show, but progress marches on, and now [Alex] created his own Star Trek-style automatic doors for his house.

The build includes a ‘control panel’, and [Alex]’s door operates in three modes: Open, and stay open; Close, and stay closed; and Automatic. The control panel itself is fairly remarkable. A small puck interacts with a magnetometer underneath [Alex]’s counter. If the puck is pointed towards ‘Open’, the door stays open. If the door is pointed towards ‘Closed’, the door stays closed. If the puck isn’t near the magnetometer, the door operates in automatic mode with the help of a few IR sensors to detect someone trying to get in or out of [Alex]’s kitchen.

For the mechanical portion of the build, [Alex] used a One meter long piston with the quietest air compressor he could find. We can’t tell from the video after the break if the compressor ever kicks in, but [Alex] says it’s about the same volume as his fridge. As a small added bonus, the new automatic door does have a fwoosh sound, just like [Gene] would have wanted.

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Halloween Hacks: A Radioactive Display With More Trick Than Treat

November 1, 2011 by Mike Nathan 11 Comments

Halloween Hacks Banner

radioactive_barrel_display

[Shawn] was looking for a way to shake up his decorations this Halloween and decided to build a new prop for his front yard. He had a pair of old oil barrels in his garage and thought they would look great with a little bit of work.

He bolted the pair of barrels together, then slapped a fresh coat of black paint on them before adding a bright yellow radiation trefoil to each one. One barrel contains a pneumatic piston that opens the lid, revealing a light up pumpkin, a fog machine, and a set of water nozzles that spray the area. The second drum houses an air compressor, a wireless router, and an IP camera for recording the action. A web-enabled Arduino triggers the lid and sprayer, both of which can be controlled from the comfort of his house.

We think it’s a creative use of some old scrap barrels, but we’re hoping he doesn’t plan on wetting trick-or-treaters that pass through, as it seems like a good way to get your house egged or otherwise vandalized on Halloween. If the water sprayer were perhaps swapped out with some other cool effects, [Shawn] is far less likely to be the target of some angry, wet teenagers.

Be sure to check out the video below to see the display in action.

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Amazing Pipe Organ Desk Features Secret Compartments And An All-wood Logic Board

July 20, 2011 by Mike Nathan 38 Comments

wood_organ_desk_with_secret_compartment

Feeling pretty good after putting together your brand new standing computer desk? Step aside please, [Kagen Schaefer] has something he’d like to show you.

His Pipe Organ Desk is undoubtedly one of the coolest pieces of furniture we have seen in a long time. The project took [Kagen] over three years to complete, which sounds about right once you see how much attention was put into every last detail.

This desk is amazing in several ways. First off, the entire desk was constructed solely from wood. The drawers, the supports, knobs, screws, and even the air valves – all wood. Secondly, when one of the desk’s drawers are pushed in, air is directed to the organ pipes at the front of the desk, which plays a note.

A small portion of the air is also directed into the desk’s pneumatic logic board, which keeps track of each note that has been played. When someone manages to play the correct tune, a secret compartment is unlocked. The pneumatic logic board is an unbelievable creation, consisting of well over 100 wooden screws which can be tuned to recognize any number of “secret tunes”.

Sure a well-placed axe can open the compartment too, but who would destroy such a fine piece of work?

[via Make]

Inventing Robot Athletes

December 14, 2010 by Mike Szczys 19 Comments

The human body is an amazing instrument from an engineering standpoint. Replicating just one part of it proves extremely difficult but these athletic legs show a lot of promise. This is the work of a Japanese researcher named [Ryuma Niiyama]. He’s been working on the design for years, and is now using pneumatic actuators to mimic the muscles in a human leg. The lower portion of the leg uses a spring mechanism that resembles some running prosthetics currently in use. These serve as a spring to store energy and reuse it by bouncing against the ground. He’s trying to teach his robot to use these legs; taking it through a learning process necessary to use the thigh actuators for locomotion and balance. We were surprised at how life-like the motion in the video after the break is. Even when falling down the movements are very life-like. We thought the movements of Little Dog were real enough to be creepy, and this robot may be close enough to our own mannerisms to fall into the uncanny valley.

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