GIFs of D-O's movements

[kresty]

Tony Stockert took some of the video from the stage demonstration and stabilized it.  Interesting look at some of the motions.

Looking

D-O (Dio) "Look" motion

And Nodding

D-O Nodding

I thought it was interesting how the linkage is used to keep the head level in the "looking" mode and used by itself to "nod".  Probably a good idea to keep the system in balance for those motions so he doesn't move when just looking and nodding.  (Keep the head's neck centered and the system appropriately counterweighted.)

And Turning:

D-O Turning

Turning is very interesting.  It's really hard (like impossible) to see in the original video AFAICT, but in Tony's clip you can see that between the tire and the outer edges there's a "ring".  The current supposition is that it's actually driving on those two "wheels" in tank mode.  These drive wheels also help keep it from falling over.  For this to work, the tire has to be soft or allow the treads to slide up when weighted.

Another possibility is that these wheels aren't driven and are allowed to freewheel, only being used for support. That hypothesis then suggests a flywheel type mechanism as the builders would've been familiar with BB-8's system.

[Dyne]

I'm definitely curious about turning, or more precisely steering. I just assumed there was a flywheel ala bb8 for the pivot motion.

Edit: OK, I see the rings and it definitely looks like one is moving in one direction and the other the opposite direction. So tank drive seems plausible. If that's not the mechanism, I don't see much point in allowing the ring to move independently of both the central tire and the outer hub (both are static when it's turning, whereas the rings aren't)

[kresty]

Yea, I was sure they were delusional at first and a BB-8 style drive made sense, but this makes it more obvious that the edges are driven. I'm *guessing* that the tire bit is freewheeling and just moves when it drags on the carpet. One question is if the "tire" is soft, like rubber or something, or one person suggested it maybe has segments that are normally pushed up but spring down when weighted. (A couple of the frames look like there're shadows on them like maybe some such system had segments out of place.)

[James-Rice]

Stupid question but do we even know if the centre is meant to move in the light of this?

[kresty]

Stupid question but do we even know if the centre is meant to move in the light of this?

I believe that we see the middle rotating in some of the sources.  It may just be friction with the sides dragging it along, not sure.

I intend for my build to have it sort of free-wheeling.

[Dyne]

The other day, Matt Denton posted the first video in a short series about his D-O build (below), which is a modified version of Michael Baddeley's design (so he doesn't break his NDA).

Conveniently, about 8 seconds in there's a snippet from the stage droid appearance, in which you can clearly see the center wheel rotating.

Whereas Michael's design has the tire recessed so it doesn't strike the ground at all, Matt is making his more like the stage droid, using a similar solution to what we discussed in the early threads and Envisaged was testing here.

Later in the video, you can see that Matt has the center wheel freewheeling on bearings mounted around the outer rim of the large gear (the one that rotates the green side rims used for actual propulsion).


Here's Matt's video:

[kresty]

Yea, I was thinking of hooking the Wiki up to link to Matt's video and some of the files and stuff...

[deathproof]

I knew that thing reminded me of something.

[kresty]

Whereas Michael's design has the tire recessed so it doesn't strike the ground at all, Matt is making his more like the stage droid, using a similar solution to what we discussed in the early threads and Envisaged was testing here.

Yea, I'd been noticing that the "tire" seems pretty flexible.  I was thinking he should've printed it in white, wonder how you get paint to adhere to that stuff?

[Dyne]

Yea, I'd been noticing that the "tire" seems pretty flexible.  I was thinking he should've printed it in white, wonder how you get paint to adhere to that stuff?

The second video just got posted.  He eventually reprinted the tire in white.





Hopefully people will forward any useful info from the Facebook group for those of us that refuse to give Mark Zuckerberg our business.