I am a mom of a ten year old Boy who is driving me crazy.
Please help me
I was wondering if someone could maybe give me some idea on
a project my ten year old son has to do for a final school project
He is suppose to make a moving robot? This is how he is going
doing to do it.
His sister made a wolf man dummy for her art class finial (she is 17).
Now he wants to take “her Dummy” and make it talk (howl.) and raise it’s
hands like it is going to attack you. His teacher says it has to do this in a “loop”? He has to have it use house hold electricity as the power supply no batteries. This teacher said each child could only spend fifty dollars on their project.
(I am so glad it is the end of school year.)
My question is what supplies do I buy him and where do I get
them to get My son’s final school project done.
This is the exact product he needs, but it’s beyond the budget: robotshop.com/en/servocity-4 … yback.html (you connect it to servo motors) robotshop.com/en/servo-motors.html (these allow for 180 degree motion, perfect for opening / closing a jaw, raising an arm etc).
The only way around this is to do programming, and/or use a computer / laptop.
Any inexpensive solution we propose will require quite a bit of programming and electrical knowledge.
We understand your dilemma, but an “easy to use” solution will cost a bit, whereas an inexpensive solution is quite a bit more complex to implement.
What approach would you like to take?
Thank you for your help. I guess we will just have to brake the budget.
The requirements are the arms have to move like they are reaching for you. It has to talk (howl.) in a loop?(what ever that means). The mouth and face don’t have to move those are a Halloween mask and a foam ball,And it has to run off house hold current.
( I am so glad this thing don’t have to walk, But I guess at this point it would make it easer if it did,Ha Ha not really ). I am so grateful for your help.
Would you be able to send me a parts list of everything I need to buy. I truly don’t know what to get .Looking at this stuff makes my head spin. And if you could send me step by step instruction on getting this thing working that sure would help . Please, Please, tell me there is no Soldering, at this point my house could burn down. Again thank you for your help. If it wasn’t for you I would still trying to find out where to start .If you want when we get this but together I will send you some pictures. [email protected]
You need to power this either using a 4.8V to 6V battery pack, or wall adapter (do you have a preference?).
Aside from that, you only need the servo motors, the choice of which depends on the torque (force x distance) per section.
Note that if the arm is really heavy, you’ll need a powerful servo. Same for the jaw. robotshop.com/en/servo-motors.html
Can you provide some images of the setup, and an idea of the weight of the jaw and the arm?
Thank you so much for your help. I sure could not do this project
without you. I tried to attach a picture file to this post. I hope you get it
so you can kind of see what I need. the dummy stands about 5 foot 11.
If you need any thing eles I will try to figure out what it is you need.
If you can help please send my instructions how to put it together and
a parts list of what and how much of each part I need. * I thought *
*helping his sister make the dummy for her class project was hard,but I don’t *
*know how to even start to help him make “wolfman” do the stuff he need it * to do for his . Again thank you
“wolf Man Dummy”
the setup is as follows
Body:
body is made of on dressmaker form
which is a hollow wood torso surrounded by white cotton
batting on a metal pole ( Metal pole does not touch wood frame)
(this was a lady torso so my daughter filled it
out to a more “man form” with more cotton Batting.
(I used this form to make the girl dresses and costume
for the “plays” at school.it had no arms or legs just torso )then daughter
made man out of it.
I can attach a board or plastic parts or any thing else required to the back
of this form to attach your setup.
Head and Voice:
Head is made of foam ball with a Halloween mask for face
( mouth is not moveable)
I just need sound effect (like it is talking and howling ) in a “constant loop”.
Arms and hands:
Arms are a foam noodle (pool float) that do not bend at this time ,
but I will be making the arms over with movable joints when I get you set up
instructions because my son needs them to raise and lower to look like they are reaching to claw you.
The hands are just Halloween gloves stuffed with more batting.
the hands will not bend or move just the arms.
Legs will not move (so you don’t have to make it walk )
Power supply:
He needs to have the power supply be house hold electricity no batteries.
Voice can be done easily: robotshop.com/en/voice-recorder-module.html
On the day it’s presented, be sure to have extra batteries.
You could de-solder the buttons and place them in such a way that when the arm is raised, it presses against the button and triggers the sound.
As for the arms, if the motion is repetitive (i.e. no delays), you can use a DC geared motor and 4-bar mechanism: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four-bar_linkage
A cheap windshield wiper motor should be powerful (and cheap) enough, and you can use lightweight sections of wood to create the 4-bar.
As for connecting it to the mains (household power), you just need a 12V wall adapter.
Note that this is high current stuff, so be sure of the connections.
Lifting a heavy arm is not easy, so do anything you can to make it lightweight (ex use chicken wire instead of wood)
The previous approach using a servo recorder would be more versatile, but quite a bit more expensive, and a servo with enough torque to lift an arm is not cheap either.
This seems like a very advanced project for a Boy Scout.
You can use an Arduino board, and control four or so R/C servos easily.
You’ll need to learn to program it in C.
Use a servo control program to determine the waypoints for the servo moves. Make up a list of moves (coordinates), and a simple program to loop through the desired points.
Servos have been recommended, just follow simple servo control examples to learn how to use the servo commands. the SSC32 would be a good idea, it makes moving a set of servos in a group quite easy.
Voice I’ll leave to someone else, but speech cards are available, and simply sending a string of phonemes (text) to them will give you your speech.
Thank you
You are a wonderful person to help me. I am so thankful for you taking time to help.
I think for right now as you suggested I am going to use windshield wiper motor and voice-recorder-module with 12V wall adapter.That. should get his project done for this year…
Oh But I got a “heads up” for the teacher for next school year…seems he will have to use servos motors , make robot walk, talk and program it to do it all…so I guess in my summer spare time between work and all I will be spending it trying to learn all I can to help him. I sure wish I could take classes on how to program and use all this stuff, but no money to do that.
I don’t know I explained this to you or not, My son is a “special need child” and the school he has to go to has no classes for “special need” children. So it kind of fall on me to try to help him so he gets his projects done and is not bullied by the other children,that his project is “lame” and doesn’t look like to other kids. But with the help you gave us his will be one of the best. I know because I have seen most of the projects that have been turned in so for and will be judged next Wednesday (May 13) his is one of the top. Any tip you want to give me on next year project or how to understand and learn all this stuff just let me know…at least I have all summer to get this stuff together for next fall. looking at parts list when they list thing is there a “trick”
Look up the Lynxmotion “Brat” kits. They’re small, but can be made to walk. Making a full-sized robot walk upright like I think you’re suggesting would be a major undertaking, to say the least.
Hexapod or Brat robots would be more reasonable. It all costs money. If you have a college robotics lab staff and funding you might take on a human sized walking 'bot.
Reading through the threads on this and other forum will get you started. Seems like a lot of education for you, that your son may or not benefit from. Where is this teacher coming from?
