Perhaps you could enlist the aid of your compatriot AKdaBAOUS to help speed things up. His latest picture show a face that fairly cries out for a hug.
But where are the wonderfully cut center plates…
You are more than welcome to do a face hugger design. I have no control over that. But i appreciate that you asked.
its will be great to see a different approach.
Erics wonderful craftsmanship at work here:
Again a photo-realist concept and not the actual physical, but you get the idea.
I really do, and i will finish this. but other things have taken poll position.
Looking very professional indeed.
Is the face hugger project for fun or for a customer?
What material are the base plates?
I cannot say anything about the project, but the plates are in G10.
Thank you.
No this is a privately funded project. If it was for a customer it would have been finished by now.
Looking pretty nice, good job with the design. but that servo structure … I’ve never seen it before, did you custom made those for your legs ?
Info on the servo parts can be found at my NEW website…
innerbreed.co.uk
in “buy my products”
Sorry iv not put a direct link, my phone is playing up.
Thanks.
So… 11+ years on.
7 design iterations.
And the design has finally landed on its feet. (Fingers in this case).
Id like to take some time (because 11+ years is clearly not long enough) and gather together a portfolio of all the previous designs that’s now led me to the 7th Generation Robotic Facehugger System that will be presented soon.
I will show each design in detail and how each design generation has improved on the last.
Keep an eye out.
Really looking forward to it! Any plans to work on a “skin”?
My project started a few years ago. All the way back in 2013. Well initially I touch on doing this project in 2010 but nothing actually came to light until 2013 when I first started designing it.
So that’s a good place to start this, I think.
The project shared here today is a walking robot conceptualised and replicated from the alien film franchise creature known as the Facehugger.
Gen 1 was designed in 2013.
Although previous to this I was exploring robotics and animatronics, so I had somewhat of an understanding of how I was going to pull this project off.
Generation one was my first conceptualised design.
Designed to run off a Botboard and SSC-32 and HS645MG servos
It was a cable driven design with external placed actuators that ran into the body from a main control box along with the power supply. Although the design was never finished, I was able to learn a lot from this and any mistakes or problems that I ran into, I was able to rectify in later models.
The design was simple and didn’t really push any boundaries and I didn’t really run into any issues, it was just that the approach was wrong and that made me cease moving the project further.
Gen 2 was designed in 2016 - 2017
The ideas behind this was to use smaller integrated dc motors with integrated feedback systems in each joint.
I was basically building my own servo joints with this one.
With the 90 degree motor to joint arrangement I was able to get really nice thin fingers with this design. I had opted for a 4 degree of freedom leg design to allow more natural movements when transitioning through its gait cycle. I didn’t find the legs to be very strong and so the idea to complete this was abandoned.
Again, with this one I did choose to power it externally due to weight and space inside of the robot.
Designed to run off a Arduino Uno and SSC32 and N20 custom motors
Gen 3 was designed in 2020 - 2021
Quite possibly the nicest looking design. With that said also the most complex one yet with everything compacted into the small body. Motors, power, control boards etc.
I had designed my own integrated motor systems with feedback at each joint.
The design also incorporated peristaltic drives in the sacks for added effect.
Generation 3 was more of a hexapod with only 6 walking fingers as the two front fingers were used as “feelers” and wasn’t designed to support any of the walking motion.
Due to the complexities in manufacturing with material shrinkage a lot of the tolerances were out and of course this created issues with gear meshing and cable routing was very intricate.
Designed to run off a Arduino Mega and SSC-32U and custom motors
Gen 4 was designed in 2021 - 2022.
Generation 4 joins the cable driven group and ironed out most of the issues in Gen 3 but still following the custom-made integrated actuator idea.
A material change helped out with tolerances but did mean the design was almost too heavy to actually walk. With the design slightly larger than want I intended; I soon abandoned it.
Designed to run off a Arduino Mega and SSC-32U and modified RDS3115MG Servos
Gen 5 was designed in 2022 - 2023.
A brief design was done for Generation 5. Only to explore using stock motors and custom feedback. The body was again oversized, but I did start to shrink down the electronics setup. Its over size was quite expensive to manufacture and ultimately, I abandoned this idea.
Designed to run off a Arduino Nano and SSC-32U and modified RDS3115MG Servos
Gen 6 was designed in 2023.
Generation 6 was a direct driven mech. Designed to be stronger and incorporated linear actuators.
Actuator throw and speed was always going to be an issue that I knew about when I started and I did hope that I would find a solution for this later down the line.
This was the most expensive build out of all its predecessors.
Designed to run off an Arduino Mega and PQ12-R Linear Servos.
Gen 7 was designed in 2024…
its true to say that there has been a number of things that are the reason for such a long term project to have taken this long, as well as reasons why there has been so many design ideas.
Family and work life etc is an obvious one but also as technology has moved forward, so did the designs. Not only in terms of design packages, and what they would offer the project but also the physical parts available on the market. Control boards have got smaller with bigger features. Servos have got smaller with higher torque… all these things.
Coding is also a factor and massive improvements have been made since day one.
My skill in all these areas has also been a massive factor. Learning new things and implementing them into the projects.
Well… So Generation 7!
More to follow…
Oh wow… just… wow
Thanks man.
Should have a delivery soon of some parts but i am holding out on ordering the motors due to cost so that will delay things a bit.
However it has allowed me to concentrate on other aspects of the project.
I have all the legs assembled but dont really want to mount them until i have the servos and pulley cables installed.
This is incredible timing for the new Aliens: Romulus movie which seems to have quite a few facehugger scenes in the trailer.
Yeah i kind of wished i was further along with this and had something to show as the new trailer release would have ran parallel with the project. Hoping by the actual cinematic release ill have this up and running (no pun intended).
Might even get a chance to attend an opening. .
A small update:
So i am just waiting on some new custom servo hubs for the pulley cables as the groove wasnt quite as wide as id of liked. They should arrive in a week.
I have ordered half the servos for now so i can at least test one side of the legs (fingers) before i order the rest just to make sure it will actually work.
Here is a shot of the body with the pulley channels (v-gooved bearings set up.
I will start adding in some of the electronic components and once the new hubs arrive i can then complete half the assembly so really looking forward to that.