Keyboard robot project

Help & Support Professional Robots
1

Hello, I have a question about actuators.

Suppose I wanted some kind of actuator/motor/mechanism that could physically press a key on my laptop keyboard - what would I need?

I’m looking for something akin to a linear actuator only that I dont need to control distance; I would need it to simply shoot out to press a key and then shoot back to reset. It would need to be very fast and very accurate with almost no delay (or at least a consistent delay that could be accounted for in code) and it wouldn’t need to produce a lot of force like most linear actuators (even 1 lb. would be too much). Also, it would need to be plugged into a raspberry or arduino obviously.

Is there something like this? Whats it called?

Thank you

2

Looked up a solenoid, and i just gotta say wow, thats exactly what I need. You’re the man Cbenson - thanks a lot.

Maybe you could help me with my machine vision camera post as well?

3

I think it’s depends !:cool:

4

I love the idea of having an actuator to your laptop keyboard. Looking forward to it.

5

There are several approaches you could take to this:

  1. Robotic arm: can reach anywhere on the keyboard, but is not very fast
  2. solenoid above every key (this would be incredibly fast, but you would need one for every key
  3. rotational actuator coupled to something which does linear motion and finally something to press the button (like a solenoid)

DC linear actuators are not very fast, and you would need additional actuators in order to be able to move to every button. If you only need it to press one button, then perhaps just set up a solenoid above that key. A solenoid is simply on (fully extended) and off (fully retracted).