Hexapod draws with a Pen

Matt Denton from Micromagic Systems has taken his cool Hexapod robot and allowed it to have some fun wih a pen! The results are very interesting.

"Using B.F.Hexapod with an additional floating pen attachment, and a utility I wrote to convert DXF files into translation commands for my p.Brain controller, I have got the start of a walking CNC router! Why… I don’t know.. it just seemed like a good idea at the time!

I still have to add a small routing head and test the cutting capabilities, but you get the idea. Resolution of the work area is pretty low, somewhere between 7 & 8 bit, with about 0.5mm repeatability, so it’s never going to make precision parts! Also I have only implemented straight lines within the p.Brain, so the utility converts arcs and circles into segments.

One obvious improvement to resolution & repeatability is to have a work surface (in this case paper) that doesn’t move around, in this video the only thing holding the paper in place.. is the hexapod’s feet. In order to keep the router out of the way while walking, I plan on attaching a servo to the router head to swing the head from a horizontal to vertical position. Or maybe I will have come to my senses by then!! If I’m really mad I could try some 3D milling.. as technically the hexapod Is a 6 axis CNC machine."