Paper Robots, Part 2
Paper linkages are pretty neat, but ultimately if I want these little parts to do anything I need to figure out how to make them move. Not being force based actuators, servos are the wrong answer, but they’re cheap and I have piles of them. Because of their ubiquity, supporting hardware is easy to find as well. For example, these excellent low cost, high channel count PWM servo driver boards from Pololu.
Paper Robots, Part 1
I’ve been trying to make little paper robots. Or rather, I’ve been trying to create a library of mechanical linkages that I could later make robots with. Paper is cheap, easy to work with, and I can try out a bunch of different ideas quickly without breaking my piggy-bank. In some forms, such as cardboard, paper is extremely strong for its weight. This makes it an ideal platform for building robots, and leads to The First Problem with robotics: any sufficiently agile robot will weigh less than its power supply.
When I Grow Up.
Two years ago I quit my job at a silicon valley based froot company to follow my dream of becoming any thing but a computer programmer. I had been programming since I was 15, professionally since I was 19, and it was high time to move on to another career. This is hard. As I’m often fond of pointing out to other makers: any sufficiently interesting hardware problem will devolve into a software problem.
On Laser Repair.
Recently, I acquired a laser cutter.
It’s a giant beast of a thing, originally designed for fabric cutting. It was built by the Han Yue Ming Laser Company in Dongguan, China and features an enormous 1400x900mm cutting envelope and a 150W tube. We do a lot of design work around here that gets cut out on lasers, so finally having one in house was pretty exciting!
I Made a Poster.
Yesterday I read an article in the LA Weekly about a new Shepard Fairey “HOPE” poster. The poster features the grinning face of “V”, a comic book character in an Alan Moore graphic novel who uses highly theatrical violence to inspire people to revolt against their tyrannical government. “V” wears a stylized grinning Guy Fawkes mask which has a become a popular icon of political uprisings.