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  • Author Author: dubbie
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Walking Robots #2 : Tobbie is Completed

dubbie

Continuing with my investigation of walking robots I have completed making Tobbie, as illustrated in the video below. I am very impressed with the mechanical engineering and design of this product and I think it is a great robot. I am sure that there is much more that can be done with this than just playing with it's supplied functions.

 

 

The walking mechanism is fascinating. It uses alternating sets of three legs to move forwards or backwards. It uses three legs because it is always stable so while one set of three legs is on the ground Tobbie is stable, so that the other three can be moving forwards or backwards. I'm not entirely sure how it turns yet, maybe some vector type combination of the two sets of legs.

 

It seems perfectly feasible to replace the existing electronics in Tobbie's head with an Arduino Nano or similar. I might even have a go at this myself.

 

Dubbie

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  • in reply to three-phase

    Donald,

     

    I have done a little bit of design in my time, although not with any great success and I think it helps me at least, to understand when something is well designed. I agree that for the price, this toy is very well designed and someone or a group of someones has put in a great deal of time, effort and thinking. Or maybe they are just very good designers!

     

    Dubbie

  • in reply to dubbie

    As well as the actual design concept, the parts also look to be good quality. The plastic mouldings looked to be clean without much flashing. I agree someone(s) has put in a lot of effort into this and should be proud of what they have produced.

     

    Kind regards

  • in reply to three-phase

    Daniel,

     

    I agree that the moulding is very good, although I did spend lots of time carefully removing the flashing where the parts connected to the plastic framework. Most of the parts are reasonably sturdy although the legs are a little bit thin in places but that's mostly down to the shape of the leg (deep and wide). It is likely that some sort of computer optimisation was used with designing the plastic moulding layout as there are a couple of quite thin pieces (which are only cosmetic) on the insides of the arms, and they have been raised up as if to use more plastic in the supports.

     

    They have also paid some good attention to the visual aspects as well. Tobbie could have been all moulded from a single colour, but by selectively moulding pieces some in yellow and some in black they have obtained a good colour contrast which is visually appealing. There are a few pieces thsat do not seem to have any true purpose. For example the black circular part on the top of the head does not seem to have any specific use. It is as if there was some other function that may be haven used at some time such as LEDs or infrared communications.

     

    Dubbie