Star Wars VII Soccer Ball Droid

[mvanwalks421]

I'm no engineer, but if I correctly understand what you've all been talking about, it seems the unanimous concept would be as follows. Since we don't know if this droid will "brake" using the inside motors or some sort of retractable auxiliary feet, I'm sticking with what we saw in the trailer (an unbroken sphere that rolls with an "R2" head parallel to the plane of the ground). If it turns out this droid does use "retractable auxiliary feet," then the feet will have to retract into the structure of the ball itself, and not inside the ball where the mechanism for movement would be. And if that is the case, some sort of gyro would have to be designed in order for the droid to "decide" which legs to extend and which ones to keep inside. I digress, that is not a concern with this concept.



A: The "R2" styled head, made of a lightweight plastic, fixed on a circular rail on top of section B, and fitted with a motorized rubber wheel so that it can turn it's head on top of the flat surface of section B.
B: A magnet/set of magnets encased in a lightweight plastic structure. This structure would have a flat top fixed with with a circular rail so that section A canattach and turn, a spherical bottom to be "flesh" with section C, and balls/rollers fixed in the spherical bottom so that it can roll across the surface of section C. (The reason section B exists is so that the droid can be able to turn it's head).
C: A ball with a wireless motorized interior, very much like the Sphere 2.0, and a magnet/set of magnets mounted on top of the motor so that it will pull towards the magnet/set of magnets in section B and keep the droid's head on.

Now I'm assuming that the Sphere 2.0's wireless motorized interior stays almost perfectly parallel to the plane of the ground when moving due to the gyro. If it's parallel position is not as absolute as it would theoretically be, then the wireless motorized interior of the droid will need to be heavily weighted between the bottom motorized wheels.

 

[AndyJ]

I'm no engineer, but if I correctly understand what you've all been talking about, it seems the unanimous concept would be as follows. Since we don't know if this droid will "brake" using the inside motors or some sort of retractable auxiliary feet, I'm sticking with what we saw in the trailer (an unbroken sphere that rolls with an "R2" head parallel to the plane of the ground). If it turns out this droid does use "retractable auxiliary feet," then the feet will have to retract into the structure of the ball itself, and not inside the ball where the mechanism for movement would be. And if that is the case, some sort of gyro would have to be designed in order for the droid to "decide" which legs to extend and which ones to keep inside. I digress, that is not a concern with this concept.

View attachment 410735

A: The "R2" styled head, made of a lightweight plastic, fitted with a motorized rubber wheel that turns on top of the flat surface of section B.
B: A magnet/set of magnets encased in a lightweight plastic structure. This structure would have a flat top, and a spherical bottom so that any contact made with the ball, section C, would be as flesh as possible.
C: A ball with a wireless motorized interior, very much like the Sphere 2.0, and a magnet/set of magnets mounted on top of the motor so that it will push against the force of the magnet/set of magnets in section B.

Now I'm assuming that the Sphere 2.0's wireless motorized interior stays almost perfectly parallel to the plane of the ground when moving due to the gyro. If it's parallel position is not as absolute as it would theoretically be, then the wireless motorized interior of the droid will need to be heavily weighted between the bottom motorized wheels.

The issue with this is it creates a little catch-22, in that you need very strong magnets to hold the head on (even with a light head, a bump would likely send it flying) but the stronger the magnets, the more friction there is between the head and ball so the higher the tendency to "stick" to the ball as it rolls, which could give it that initial bump needed to send it flying off in the first place.

I see a big issue with hemispherical wheels: the contact points with the ground are very close together.

I never even thought of that, and it's a really good point. The center of mass is wrong.

That does bring me back to this picture though, which I always wondered why they drew it like a football:



Perhaps it has something to do with counteracting this effect.

 

[mvanwalks421]

The issue with this is it creates a little catch-22, in that you need very strong magnets to hold the head on (even with a light head, a bump would likely send it flying) but the stronger the magnets, the more friction there is between the head and ball so the higher the tendency to "stick" to the ball as it rolls, which could give it that initial bump needed to send it flying off in the first place.

Then maybe the magnets could be used to attract each other and small balls at the bottom of section B could be used to roll on top the surface of section C?

 

[BruceKenobi]

@BruceKenobi I assume you mean something like Sidewinder's concept right?
View attachment 410314

However, forgive me, but I'm still not convinced this is technically feasible. I can see something like this achieving somewhat a rudimentary balancing act- like those 3 axis research robots- but I feel this design lends itself to more issues than it solves. For one, the upper mag is still connected to the ball's surface, which would mean that either the magnets would have to be strong enough to keep the head fixed in a stable position while the ball is spinning yet weak enough that it doesn't interfere with a rotating surface. These two variables would be in constant opposition to each other and depending on the speed of which the ball is expected to rotate, would constantly be throwing off the magnetic attraction.
I'm not saying it can't be done, but I'd like to see a working example of it being achieved so I can understand it better. I may compile a document later today that discusses the available types of ball balancing robots as well.

Similar to that, but the upper magnet CANNOT be attached to the outter shell. For it to work, the upper magnet has to be connected to the internal ball rotating electronics, but the outter shell has to freely move, the feat is done with magnetic fields, which the R2 head would have inside, like a picture shown by mvanwalks421 but without the "B" part.

 

[ct23456]

My money is on her being able to transform in something slightly more standard, that or each circle has a different droid arm thingy

 

[Amazing DJ]

I think I know how they motivated the Soccer Droid.

 

[Mara Jade's Father]

Free printable 3D file: http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:570274

 

[Mattonymy]

Currently trying to figure out how to split apart the model into sections for larger 3D prints. Any suggestions?

 

[Broilermaker]

As I was driving around at work I was thinking, if you made the head at 18" diameter you could use it on a regular astromech body, but I digress, you could have a rare earth magnet on the bottom of the head, and something metallic it could stick to the ball with out it being attached, of course it wouldn't roll but you could stop motion it

 

[Mara Jade's Father]

If you can make the ball roll by itself, all you need to do is get a long stick and a wire, attach it to the head, and run behind it.

Problem solved.

YOU'RE WELCOME!!!

 

[Knightjar]

If the head could drive freely over the surface of the ball, it wouldn't take much robotic logic for it always to steer to the highest point. You can then use any method you want to rotate the ball and the head will always scurry to the top point as it rolls.

 

[Knightjar]

 

[Darth Lars]

How about this?:
Put a large rotating ring inside the base of the head, studded with strong magnets. The ring would act as a gyroscope that holds the head level at all times. Magnets are heavy and so they provide the ring's weight.
Then have a strong (electro)magnet inside the ball right under the head. This magnet would attract the head to the top of the ball, but it would also repel the magnets in the rotating ring thus keeping the ring around the central magnet.

 

[Edwardowan]

As I was driving around at work I was thinking, if you made the head at 18" diameter you could use it on a regular astromech body, but I digress,

just make sure you can get this new droid through a standard doorway... seems to me the body ball needs to less than 32" in diameter ... this would then dictate the size for your dome.
in a real world environment I would think the prop would need to be able to get in and out of an office or your hotel room door at a convention.

 

[Broilermaker]

Yes I think the ball could be made in hemispheres for going through doorways, the assumption is based upon an og astromech head, however it is possible that the head could be pit droid size as they do share similar characteristics: the eye, the attena. If so the droid would be smaller but without a reference to size we could all be wrong. Of course smaller would be cuter. It probably is not a astromech at all

 

[lilykill]

Free printable 3D file: http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:570274

Thanks for the mention. Carnt believe how much rep its had so quickly.

Currently trying to figure out how to split apart the model into sections for larger 3D prints. Any suggestions?

I can help since its my model. What do you want done?

 

[Mattonymy]

Any way to have have the antennae separated, as well as the dome eye, the bottom curve of the top head and the ball separated in half? I'm just trying to save on not having to use support material as well as what will take the shortest time to print.

I saw you separated the head from the ball- which is exactly what I was looking for as well. Thanks!

 

[chizbot]

What about a gyro-controlled wheeled apparatus in the head, connected to the body by a ring of spherical rare-earth mags to act as ball bearings? Then you could line the inside of the ball with a ferrous material (or have another gyro-stabilized metal ring that always stays on top)? Then you could have a remote-controlled "Sphero"-type robot in the bottom of the ball.

Just thinking aloud, really. I use some pretty heavy-duty RE magnets at work, and if you did some experimenting, you could probably get a good balance with a combination of attraction / repulsion by flipping poles.

 

[XRobots]

I'm unclear what was wrong with this idea that was suggested in post #41 - it seems to solve all the issues of building a mostly working replica (at least what we see in the trailer). Since the sphere is totally hollow it also allows scope to have opening panels and so on, provided they only open when they aren't facing directly up or down which is trivial to solve with tilt switches.

I'm pretty sure there'll be a toy version out by Christmas 2015 ;-)

Any thoughts?

 

[edspaged2]

When I first saw the trailer and saw this droid I just thought it was a droid playing soccer with kids lol. Doh...