Stokes' ProjBlog

A journal documenting innumerable, mostly terminally in-progress undertakings. Nerdiness abounds.

 

Cardboard Spider-Bot Mockup April 7, 2009

Filed under: Miscelaneous Projects — Stokes @ 7:55 pm
Some mediocre pictures of a mechanical spider leg, mocked-up with cardboard on a bulletin board.

Just to see if it would actually work, I decided to build a mock-up of a mechanical spider leg. I simply drew all the components in a graphics package, printed it out, glued it to a piece of paperboard and cut it out with a pair of scissors. I then stuck all the parts to a bulletin board, using backwards thumbtacks for the moving joints and forward ones for the fixed pivot points.

To my amazement, it actually worked. Maybe I’ll actually build the real Spider-Bot.

 
 

How to build a pressure sensor for (effectively) free April 1, 2009

Filed under: Miscelaneous Projects — Stokes @ 2:29 pm
The construction of a dirt-cheap pressure sensor.

NB: Despite the date, this actually works.

Andrew Sempere recently credited me for giving him an idea for a pressure sensor he’s currently using in a project. It was something I discovered accidentally, but further research revealed that the technique has been documented elsewhere. Regardless, I still think it’s pretty cool.
(more…)