Innovation is Here!

Hi Friends,

Here is an innovative robot designed by Sahil Rastogi (RDPS). This is a Robotic Claw that can grip objects.

If you have some interesting designs to show to us, mail us at bulo@buildingblocks.in with your name, school and age.

The Powerful Trio

Okay, so your robotic arm does not pick heavy objects and you cant keep adding Gear Systems (there are really expensive!). So what do you do?

Maybe, you should use the Powerful Trio - Force, Surface Area and Pressure into use. Let me first give you the definitions of the three concepts:

Surface Area: A mathematical term that tells us how much surface is exposed
Force: Any external influence that makes an object move.
Pressure: Force applied per unit area.

Using all three, you can spread the force to an area. Lets take an example of this object lifter:

This lifter has a cool gear system. But notice the Arm is attached through the small axle. It has a small area of contact on the Long L Clip.

Less the surface area, more is the net pressure on the area of contact. And the resultant force on the shaft of the motor makes it difficult to pick objects.

Here's the solution. Design the robot in such a way so that the pressure is distributed to different contact points.

This Object Lifter can lift greater load as we now have two points of contact where pressure is well distributed.

The Powerful Trio definitely makes your robot more powerful!!

At the Right Angle

What is Torque?

Torque is a force that tends to rotate objects. Any rotating body has three parts:

1. Origin of axis: The point around which the body rotates.

2. Distance of arm : The origin and the point at which force is applied

3. Angle of force: The angle between the arm and force applied.

The angle of force is very crucial. Any force directed parallel to the particle’s position vector does not produce torque.

Torque is applied in various parts of the robot:

1. The robot base:

If you require the robot base to move, we need to turn the robot. The torque at the base depends on the force applied by the motor. Force is a function of mass and acceleration. Hence both speed of the motor and weight of the robot matter in the robot base.

2. The robot arm:

The concept of torque is important in a robot arm. Here torque is generally applied on the shaft of the motor. We can increase the torque in the arm using Gear Systems. The application of gear systems is given in another document.

So next time you design a robot, remember to keep the angle right!!

Robotic Arm - One Degree of Motion

Hi,

Here's a Robotic Arm with 1 degree of motion.

This model has been created with the BuLo Robotronics Lite robotics kit.

Degrees of Freedom

Degree of Freedom(DOF) is a very important concept in robotics. A robot arm can have movement either in one, two or three dimensions. Based on the the movement, the robot arm can have the following Degrees of movements:

1. One dimension will have one degree of freedom. This means it can only change its location form one point to another. Similar to a sliding door.
2. Two dimensions will have three degrees of freedom. The object can change its as well as rotate along an axis.Similar to a pendulum.
   
3. Three dimensions will have six degrees of freedom. The object can move as well as rotate along all three axis. Similar to a human hand.

So, while you are creating robotic arms, do keep the DOF in mind!

Ball Thrower Design

The above design is a ball thrower that can pick up a ball and throw in different directions. You can make this robotics design amongst many others using Robotronics LITE.