Asked — Edited

Foam Animatronic Help

I had a project in mind that's basically a foam lightweight built animatronic, from Five Nights At Freddys. This one I had in mind is Foxy the pirate fox, standing about 5 feet tall. I wanted his arms to move, his jaw to open and close, his ears to move, his torso to move slightly and his head to turn. I originally wanted him to be biped, but if that's not possible I planned on having him stationary on a corner stage. Some other features I wanted him to have was

Autonomous ability Ability to see Ability to react to sounds, including his name His eyes should glow when the lights are off, though I'll probably use glow paint. I also wanted him to be able to blink, but even I'm not sure how to do that.

Any advice on what kits or parts to use? User-inserted image


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#1  

Unless you're willing to spend about 8-9 thousand dollars, bipedal motion would be impossible for a robot of this scale, even if its made out of lightweight foam. Keeping it stationary could reduce cost and complexity. I would suggest using a sabertooth and motors with the EZ-B, since basically any kind of servo probably wouldn't have enough torque to move such a large object. However, the face (maybe even the head) could be controlled via servos.

May I suggest going with a smaller project first, instead of jumping head first into what will probably be a difficult project? It would probably save you time and money when you actually build Foxy since you'll really know robotics by then. Just my two cents ;)

#2  

Take a look at the lexi 3000 project, as it ran into bumps with large sizes.

Even though its foam, the bot will way a fair bit, and the ez-robot HD servos won't move the arm shoulder joint well. Maybe the elbow, and for sure the hands.

For the jaw, use the sound servo control.

Ears: just write a script moving servos attached to the ears.

Torso: Might need a stronger servo than the HD ez-robot one, but with a good frame, and a support system(so the servo isn't squished) it could work.

No possibility for biped motion as far as I'm concerned, unless you have a deep pocket for Industrial servo motors.

Hope it helped.

PRO
Synthiam
#3  

hi! Welcome to the forum!

technopro is right, the servos on this website won't move the shoulders very well - but the servos will be fine for elbows, hands, neck, mouth, eyes, etc..

The servos you can use are more powerful and cost a little more - I would recommend strong dynamixel servos, which are compatible with the ez-robot controller (Ez-b). Pretty much anything you choose will be compatible with the controller:) .. We don't bother selling high end dynamixels because we wouldn't sell enough, so I would recommend getting them from here: http://www.trossenrobotics.com/c/robotis-dynamixel-robot-servos.aspx Keep in mind, you only need two for the shoulder

As for vision, the camera is included in the developers kit. I would get the EZ-B v4/2 Developer Kit to start - right away. Then when you ask for help to do something, people here will be able to send you code samples or tell you what to do :D