Starting Tom Servo

[nick daring]

I've wanted to build a talking Tom Servo for a while.

Thought about using this "talking skull" servo and sound board-
http://www.cowlacious.com/scary-terry-audio-servo-driver-board/

http://www.cowlacious.com/st-400-skull-kit/

 

[Daniel Nelms]

I've wanted to build a talking Tom Servo for a while.

Thought about using this "talking skull" servo and sound board-
http://www.cowlacious.com/scary-terry-audio-servo-driver-board/

http://www.cowlacious.com/st-400-skull-kit/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a1aLFzNBYxY

That's great!

 

[KennyZ]

Very interesting, Nick. That isn't what I want for Servo but that might work for Space Core.

 

[Prefect42]

Kenny,

Tom is really looking nice. And I completely understand the "expecting a wisecrack any minute" thing.

You are right to be patient with that paint. I let it sit for 3 or 4 days before painting his nose.

And thanks for the compliments. It's a great kit and a blast to build.

Ted.

 

[KennyZ]

I finally painted the silver. I freehand the engine block and masked the beak. Unfortunately I had to use that garbage blue painter's tape as I couldn't locate the tape I use on my cars. The blue tape lifted on the right hand side. I'm going to have to go decant some of the red and try to touch it up. I kind of wish I had tried to freehand the beak first.

While I had him apart I filed around the lower jaw. It was sticking because the clearance was barely there before the paint. After the paint the jaw was very hard to move. I added two thin strips of plastic under either side of the pivot point. Those worked better than the filing. Now his jaw moves easily and it closed up the space between the top and bottom beaks.

 

[Daniel Nelms]

It looks really good man!

 

[JoeRalat]

Love the Tom! MST3K is on in the background when I work. I want to do a full size crow with legs !

 

[KennyZ]

Thanks guys. I finally got up the nerve to cut out the boosters for the hoverskirt. I didn't want to screw them up but I found a trick that made it very easy. The vacuformed pieces from the kit have nice sharp lines that tell you where you'd need to cut to fit the curve of the skirt. That cutter made for acrylic sheets does a great job at scoring along those lines to the point where you can just snap the leftover bits right off.

I finally have all of Tom's parts where they should be. I've got to do some touchups and I might look into making a black felt ring to hide the lazy susan better. I'm putting him on a shelf until I find the rest of the parts I want. I need a small set of speakers that run on 6-9v that I can hide on him. I'm thinking personal music player speakers might be what I want.

 

[Daniel Nelms]

Something like?:
http://www.parts-express.com/2x2w-at-4-ohm-class-d-audio-amplifier-board--320-306
http://www.parts-express.com/visaton-frs7-4-25-full-range-speaker-4-ohm--292-528

I've used that amp in projects before it's surprisingly loud.

 

[KennyZ]

I'm going to have to look into that. I just installed a Sure 2x25w in K9 and I was extremely impressed with the sound quality and volume. Thanks Daniel.

 

[KennyZ]

Something like?:
http://www.parts-express.com/2x2w-at-4-ohm-class-d-audio-amplifier-board--320-306
http://www.parts-express.com/visaton-frs7-4-25-full-range-speaker-4-ohm--292-528

I've used that amp in projects before it's surprisingly loud.

I was just doing a test run of the amp and those speakers tonight and you are right Daniel. It's insanely loud for such a small footprint. It's painful on the highest setting. Thank you for your recommendations. I'm very happy with them. Now to figure out how to stuff it all into Tom.

 

[Daniel Nelms]

Awesome! Yeah they are impressive little things.

 

[KennyZ]

I finished the button pad for Tom. It's made from an old discarded rubbermaid lid my neighbor threw out. I went way overboard with these buttons. I figured they'd be easier for my sister to find and press but they are a lot larger than you think when you're trying to hide them under a hoverskirt.

Here's everything I have to stuff safely inside that barrel.

Sound test. The cutting board is there because the bed was absorbing too much sound. It made him hard to hear in the video.

 

[KennyZ]

He's finished except for a couple of paint touch-ups. I removed the burp in favor Tom's rendition of the funeral march but I forgot to press that button during this video. I'm going to let my sister try him out to make sure she can use everything. Then she has to wait for Christmas...maybe. She just lost her 9 year old labrador so I might let her take him early to cheer her up.

I forgot to take a photo of the inside of the barrel but the two circuit boards you see, the MP3 Trigger and the Sure Amp, are secured to the inside with hook and loop strips. Everything runs on 4 AA batteries. I changed up the lever for the mouth. I went with a thick piece of styrene and a small metal hinge. I think it works better and is a lot lighter so I didn't have to upgrade the spring that came with the kit to keep Tom from going slack-jawed.

I'll see about getting my sister to help me do a video where Tom's mouth is actually moving. It's impossible to puppet, push buttons, and video him at the same time.

 

[TOS]

Pretty hilarious project, definitely looks just like the original.

 

[KennyZ]

Thank you, I had a lot of fun with it. My sister loves him. She's already planning what audio clips and in what order to play when she meets Frank Conniff and Trace Beaulieu at Pensacon next year.

She asked for a couple of tweaks to make controlling him a little easier. I should have realized that my hands are bigger than hers.

 

[TOS]

That's really cool. Hopefully it's eased your sister's loss a bit on her dog. Always heartbreaking when you lose a family member like that.

 

[KennyZ]

My sister took Tom Servo to the Pensacola Pensacon and told me she had a blast. Tons of people stopped to take pictures with Tom. I have to brag a bit. I told her she couldn't take him to see Dr Forrester (Trace Beaulieu) or TV's Frank (Frank Conniff) without me. I tagged along when she got him signed by both actors. I've got to get photos of the signatures next time I'm at my sister's house. Mr Beaulieu drew a little Crow on his hoverskirt. They liked the way he spoke. Mr Beaulieu jokingly threatened to call Kevin Murphy when I told him the voice samples were taken from YouTube videos. They both told me it was one of the nicest Tom Servos they had seen. I'm not sure if they say that to all the Tom replica makers but I'm taking it at face value.