A hexapod with servo joints. This design is quite big and needs strong servos but looks really cool ^^.

I used 20 HD-2213MG Servos (http://www.servodatabase.com/servo/power-hd/hd-2213mg) . If you use other servos you need to modify the embeddings for the servos and servo horns. You may make the upper and lower legs shorter to get shorter leverage.

Finally the parts get assembled with M2 thread rod and nuts.

I don't have a whole lot of experience with the Arduino, but I find that I often use it as a platform to quickly prototype circuits and test out components. Since I've only got one, this generally means that I have to pull it from whatever project it happens to be currently connected up to use it for prototyping/debugging something else and hook it back up again later.

Because of this, I created this simple wiring harness so I can easily move my Arduino from one project to the next and back again with little hassle. You can freely insert jumper wires and devices with 0.1" headers with the shield on for prototyping. Then when you have the Arduino wired up how you like it, just clamp the jumper wires down to make it a little more permanent.

I also sometimes wire up miscellaneous connectors for prototyping, like the 15-pin PC joystick connector pictured, and I can connect those directly to the Arduino and not have to worry as much about accidentally pulling wires out as I'm connecting devices and moving them around with the shield installed. There's also plenty of space to access the reset button and the ISP header on my Duemilanove board should I need them.

tester for makerbot Hive76 workshop
Here's a video of the process: viddler.com/explore/eagleapex/videos/4/

Here is a simple dock made from acrylic, machine screws, and an existing iPhone/iPod cable.

It is made of four slices of 1/4″ acrylic (actual width 0.22″). The top two slices have an oval opening just snug enough to fit the ipod connector and keep it in place with friction. The third slice has a channel for the cable to escape out the back, and the bottom slice keeps the cable from falling out and provides some pushback when the iphone is inserted. It’s held together by four 1″ 2-56 machine screws with nuts. I was a little concerned with the nuts scratching the table, so I’ve since added little hot glue feet to the bottom of each nut.

I didn’t add an additional layer at the top to provide lateral support of the iphone because I didn’t have long enough screws. And besides, it doesn’t seem to need it. If I get longer screws, I might make one that has the extra layer, which would also make the dock bigger, to encompass the bottom of the iPhone. And that would be good because it adds more mass to the dock, making it more stable.

Also, see: todbot.com/blog/2009/07/15/quickie-laser-cut-iphoneipod-dock/

Same as John Park's shroom, but 6x larger and rotated to print cap first.

A few pieces that make connecting your fun electronic bits to your lego bits easy.

Long have our business cards languished face up on tables. They have cried out, "why not tilt us slightly so we may be better seen". We have finally answered their call.

A calling card with working planetary gears. Astound your friends, frustrate your nemisii.

(Update: I've moved the gears slightly to the right, reducing the number of cut parts to assemble.)

I took drepetto's AI file and cleaned it up a bit using Blends for the placement of the grooves. The Grooves in the file are stroked paths which will raster etch with the center cut. I also made little divots at the end of each line. Also, the numbers were created using my Helvetica Single Line file.

An openly designed Creative Commons Licensed robot.

Note: New Version (Beta 2.1) posted 06/05/2009

New features: 12 legs instead of 8, "drop-in" center platform, 1:1.8 ratio gears, many small changes.

I only update this listing for major revisions of the walker, it's possible there's a minor revision posted at my site that is not here: 4volt.com/projects/jansen/

What you see here is the Jansen walker, a laser-cut robot, based on the Jansen Mechanism. It has 12 legs and scuttles similar to a crab walking sideways. The brain is a Arduino, and the legs are powered by 2 micro-servos modified for continuous rotation.

This project is heavily influenced by Theo Jansen's natural gearing mechanism, it’s a very efficient mechanical leg design for converting rotary motion into leg movements, and is very elegant in my opinion. The basis is the relative distance of the 12 joins, Jansen calls them "The 12 Holy Numbers". The numbers were developed with a genetic algorithm. In a couple of interviews that he wrote the evolver on a Atari STe computer and it took literally months of 1990’s processing power to find the solution.

For more info on Theo Jansen as well as some video and pictures see strandbeest.com.

I've marked this as non-commercial creative commons licensed, but it would be very easy for anyone get me to license a commercial version to almost anyone. For the most part I would just like to make sure I agree with the usage, and make sure I am aware of it.

See vimeo.com/4221721 for a video of the motion.
The home for this project is 4volt.com/Projects/Jansen/

Also, if you don't have a laser cutter, but would like a set of laser cut parts for this project see: 4volt.com/donate.aspx#jansen

This is a slot-together model of the first stellation of a dodecahedron. The slot sizes are appropriate for "172" illustration board, but you can scale the pieces to construct this model out of other materials.