Hello everyone.
I'll keep my introduction short:
My forum name is OakMot. It's the name of a book.
I'm 24.
I've loved robots my whole life.
Now I'm an adult who can afford to build one.
I'm re purposing an old mannequin as a house robot.
mission:
Have a robot in my house that I or anyone can ask basic questions like what the forecast is, do web searches/ access a database of information/ record information I couldn't be bothered to remember myself, hold basic basic basic conversation for novelty. essentially a Siri (or jibo or whatever)for my house but physical with intractability.
it will have a head with a realistic range of mobility, as well as a right arm with 6 points of articulation. (will eventually add a second arm and maybe torso movement when I have the means to.)
Getting started:
I have a humble workshop out of my laundry room, which has a cache of basic parts and scrap metal. I work as an apprentice electrician so I've been working with mostly hand tools accompanied with a bit of sweat and blood.
I started by mounting a craft mask onto a frame built out of scrap and then fixed to two hd servos for x and y axis movement. using one of the wheels made sense as a base for the neck.
I then mounted the EZ-b onto the back of the head so the camera cable could reach. call it laziness. I got extension wires for a reason. then I mounted a red terminator like eye that does nothing except make it look menacing. it was inserted a little recessed into the mask so it gives off the illusion that it follows you around the room. also lets you know its on. the robot I mean. The fan I'm hoping is more than cosmetic. the ez-b is a small computer after all. hopefully it will keep it cool, but if it really doesn't do anything, it can look cool.
that's a joke. laugh.
at this point, I'm not on battery power anymore. I bought myself a linear DC 3 amp power supply, which converted computer power supply 12vdc to the 7.4-7.5vdc needed for the servos.
seriously though, I was eating batteries trying to get head tracking to work. 6 a night.
began work on a shoulder joint only to get frustrated and put it on hold.
reconstructed legs with articulation for portability. Also cosmetic. I have no intention of making it walk until such technology is accessible to me. side note I didnt realize I needed more protection than a face mask and safety glasses when it came to cutting fiberglass. its been a very itchy couple days.
and this is where I'm at.
current goals: -faster and smoother tracking, be it motion or face tracking. -get the arm built. -install a small computer inside the torso to both supply the ez-b with power and to run ARC .
foreseeable future goals: -be able to put one plug in the wall in order for the whole system to work. -start programming the personality with the pandorabots add on, of which I have no idea what to begin with.
unforseeable future goals: not entirely sure this project will be done anytime soon. obviously the fantasy is to have a robot man the house while I'm gone and help around the house, but I'm going to work with what I have and hopefully sometime soon It'll be something I can work towards, but for now, my robots a sitter.
I intended to have more videos and such to show, but they're currently spending a lifetime uploading to youtube, so that'll have to wait.
I look forward to being apart of this community, and I hope I can help in anyway I can to making a mechanized future more than fiction.
-OakMot
PS.:I realize I'm making a female robot and what insinuations that might bring. get you're mind out of the gutter.
Other robots from Synthiam community
Xuven's Project Atlas 1.0
Mstephens's What Should I Name This Robot?
That is impressive! Besides the inmoov project I haven't really seen many people tackle a robot of this scale. Good idea with the dress
I think your robot is pretty cool @OakMot.
A couple of thoughts on the arms. If you want to keep the fiberglass I would imagine you would need some stronger DC motors for the shoulder at least. From the elbow down could probably be servo motors.
If you forgo the fiberglass, you could probably stay with metal gear servo motors and design a light weight framework for the arms. A long-sleeved top would help keep the human appears if the framework looked too robotic.
Most awesome part of your robot is putting the EZb4 in the actually head. No one, ever does that! I love that!
Everyone puts the brain of the robot in the stomach area.
@Jeremie thank you! I wonder why that is? that people arent making more humanoid like robots.
@JustinRatliff Im not keeping the fiberglass for the arms. its too heavy. I was hoping to build most of it out of alluminum, but with my means, im learning its harder to work with than what it was made out to be before. Its times like this I wish I had a 3d printer/ knew someone who owns one so I'm not getting screwed on printing costs. I have some money, I'm not made of money. for now, its bending and cutting metal. the problem I'm having is making everything structurally sound while having the range of motion I want, being shoulder forward, back, out to the side, bicep swivel, elbow, fore arm swivel and hand grip without putting super stress on the servos. for example: if the arm is out to the side, I don't want the bulk of the weight of the forearm on the bicep swivel servo.
I'm not too concerned about hiding the mechanics (just the woman bits). its almost a form of pride when people can see I put this together out of all the different bits and pieces. if the arm is blocky, I don't really care as long as it isn't ridiculously big or long. it needs to be in proportion.
I not only think its cool to have the actual brain of the robot in the head, but I've found its really handy when it comes to maintenance and testing. if the ez-b poops the bed, its as easy as pulling it out of the base and putting in a new one.
Love your project. Great idea having the mask face and open head w/EZB4 exposed. Looking forward to updates. Steve S
I think you are doing a Great Job! Keep up the good work! Mel
Looking super cool! I am also building a humanoid robot. Mine is a bit smaller than yours, but my android will be a full scale human female android. I am having trouble making her rubber skin for her face. I am using an old non working robotic Elvis that will have a rubber female face and I installed servos in place of the old motors. I like the EZ-B brain in her head and look forward to your updates.
@mcsdaver Thanks dude. Us humanoid... Uhhh... Robot builders I guess, not sure what to call us. But we need to stick together.
Not sure what your budget is, and not really sure how expensive they are ( I think around 500 dollars) but silicone masks are the way to go. More realistic looking and acting skin. In some circumstances, you can get them custom made to your specs. If you're doing it yourself, that's extremely commendable. But If you can save yourself the trouble and the frustration for a little more money than you expected, just buy it. Of coarse, there's maybe a tutorial online for silicone mask making. Didn't look.
$500 would be a bit over my budget for her face. I am in the middle of a very expensive move right now. I do have a 3d printer, but I want rubber skin. I am using latex rubber for her skin. I mixed some paint in the latex. My humanoid Dave is 3d printed.
@Oakmot Great to see you at ezrobot HQ today! I knew I had seen your robot somewhere as it was quite familiar, but I didn't realize that you were the guy who built this specific one! It's a great idea. Keep at it and definitely ask some of the guys here in the forums for their humanoid building experiences as you are definitely among fellow full scale humanoid enthusiasts.
If you require some assistance or advice with your 3D printer I would suggest checking out the local makerspace called Protospace, they have a few guys who are masters in the way of DIY 3D printers.
Just ran across this, excellent work, any updates?
@jeremie And thank you for having me. I'd just came from work, so i know I looked like a vagrant walking in covered in dirt and holes in my clothes. If your receptionist didn't recognize me from the workshop, you'd probably have called the police.
But yeah. You were very helpful. I'm going to tinker with the scripting and see what I can get up to.
Offer still stands, if you want me to bring it to the office, we'll set some time aside for me to bring it so everyone can have a good look.
@69developer Not too many updates. Work and other hobbies get in the way. I can tell you what I've done so far:
When the initial post was made, I think I was still running off of battery power, so i quickly moved over to line power, which goes into the back of the neck and into a junction in the lower back which houses a transformer, which steps down my 120v AC to 12v ac, and that leads into a voltage regulator which converts it to the 7.4v dc the ez-b needs to run. Only problem is the regulator only outputs 3 amps. Jeremie mentioned I should look into an atx power supply, of which I will once I get some other bugs figured out.
There is a 12x12x8 metal junction box in the back, which has a splitter that feeds both the fan and eye in the head. It also houses a brix computer, which is a 4x4x2 pc with Hdmi out and wifi. I use a small wireless qwerty keyboard with mouse I bought from a Chinese electronic supplier. Head tracking is almost perfect.
The robot is talking now. I have a low profile podcasting omnidirectional mic called the Samson go mic. Only problem is it cuts outand disconnects for no reason. I bought it brand new. The thing is garbage ( it is really hard not to curse about the mic...). If anyone can suggest a better alternative mic, that'd be super. I want it to be small so it can fit in the head. It's hooked up to the pandorabots add on, but it's dependent on a Internet connection, and when the brix is already connected to the ez-b, so I need to run a cat-5 Ethernet cable to a router in order to access pandorbots. Is there an offline alternative I could use with ARC? Who knows. The arm assembly is giving me trouble because I work with scrap metal, so I bought a 3d printer, of which I have yet to get working. Ill see if I can talk to the protospace dudes and dudettes about getting it all working. It'll be a lot easier printing parts I need instead of tearing up my hands bending and cutting scrap metal. I'll do a video and post pictures later, it's just been busy, like I said before.
Oh. And it has a cuter outfit.
Hello OakMot She is a looker...?? I too used the same mask in my humanoid. Just to pass on ..I hot glued a foam board platform on the mask. I mounted the camera which looks thru a hole cut under the nose. If you hurry you can still get plastic easter eggs, and paint them up as eyes and hot glue the to mini servos. The minis are cheap and work fine. Some need voltage regs which you can get from the EZ shop tab. Look in the forum there are some things on them and how to hook them up to splitters. Eye tracking with the neck is cool. Have fun..
Ron
I like the design of the legs I wish they had servo control. That would be awesome.