The main robot arms have a 360-degree base motor, two 180 degree elbow motors that move the arm vertically and horizontally. The main joints are controlled by a "minibot" controller seen in the bottom left. The minibot's joints are made of potentiometers which send signals to the Arduino and then back out as output signals to the motors on the big robot who's movement imitates the minibot as we controlled it.The board also contains an additional potentiometer to open and close the gripper and a button that dispenses pennies.
Mechanics
SciOly Robot Arm
The stock gripper was modified to specialize in picking up and dispensing pennies. It has 3 servos on the gripper alone, one for opening and closing, a microservo to dispense pennies, and one to turn the gripper around 180 degrees. I made the silver tube from a sheet of aluminium as it was relatively durable and easy to shape. The arm was made of a combination of PVC and wood to keep it as light as possible to put less stress the high torque servo motors.
Mechanical Gripper
