Great news for those curious about “soft robotics” — Matthew Borgatti shared his Trefoil Tentacle project
as Thingiverse Thing 92103, a project he created code for via discussion here on the Adafruit Forums as he went:
I’ve been developing ways to use 3d powder printing to make air powered robots that have no hard moving parts. Using procedural modeling I can create rapid iterations, incremental designs, and inexpensive prototypes with a simple set of tools. Find more details at – http://bit.ly/softrobots
You can see video of this design in action here.
This is an early prototype of a trefoil tentacle. There are three hollow ribbed volumes inside this tentacle that control its motion. It is controlled through a Processing interface and an Arduino switching a bank of solenoid valves using a simple Darlington transistor. You can grab the code here.
This whole project has been made possible by the folks over at http://viridis3d.com especially Jim Bredt. They’ve been very generous in letting me use their machines and helping me figure out solutions to the material science challenged involved in this kind of work. They’re awesome.
Instructions
Print out three copies of the shell component on a powder printer. This method would also work on a DLP or Objet printer. Print one copy of the block mold. Infiltrate all the parts with an epoxy resin. Wax all the surfaces that will touch silicone to make sure no rubber penetrates into the matrix. If this happens it’s guaranteed to lock your mold and you’ll have to start again from the beginning.
Pour silicone into the block mold up to its rim. When it’s cured, remove it. Use an xacto to split the rubber on the overhang down at one end of the mold. Once you’ve removed the silicone, flip it over and cast wax into the voids.
Laser cut the alignment jig out of .11″ material and assemble it. This will help align and center the wax core. Take all the wax pieces out of your silicone mold and assemble them with the help of the alignment jig. Use a soldering iron to melt the wax between the seams of the tall wax pieces and the base.
Bolt the 3 mold shells together with 1/4″-20 screws and insert the wax core. Pour a slow curing silicone into the holes at the top of the mold. This mold doesn’t contain a sprue, so be careful not to pour too quickly and overflow the mold. For a bubble free casting, I recommending putting this whole assembly into a vacuum chamber, but a low viscosity silicone will do a pretty good job all by itself.
When the silicone is cured you can take the mold apart and pull out the wax core. If it doesn’t come out cleanly (mine took a lot of fiddling to finally eject) boil the tentacle in soapy water until the wax melts out.
Laser cut the stand out of 1/8″ material. Run 3/8″ tubing through the trefoil shaped piece, leaving about 1″ sticking through it. Stick the tubing into the tentacle, and adhere it to the base using silicone caulk (I use Sil-Poxy). I fastened everything together with luer fittings, and controlled the tentacle using an arduino PWM-ing a few solenoid valves. You can see my code here http://forums.adafruit.com/viewtopic.php?f=25&t=36579
For more details on the process and materials involved, you can look at some photo documentation of a tentacle coming together here – and you can find my complete writeups on the entire soft robotics project here.
Every Thursday is #3dthursday here at Adafruit! The DIY 3D printing community has passion and dedication for making solid objects from digital models. Recently, we have noticed electronics projects integrated with 3D printed enclosures, brackets, and sculptures, so each Thursday we celebrate and highlight these bold pioneers!
Have you considered building a 3D project around an Arduino or other microcontroller? How about printing a bracket to mount your Raspberry Pi to the back of your HD monitor? And don’t forget the countless LED projects that are possible when you are modeling your projects in 3D!
The Adafruit Learning System has dozens of great tools to get you well on your way to creating incredible works of engineering, interactive art, and design with your 3D printer! If you’ve made a cool project that combines 3D printing and electronics, be sure to let us know, and we’ll feature it here!