Head Actuator Mechanism

Star Wars EP7 BB-8 Droid VERSION 2

This page is the Head Control Arm, check out the main project index for the rest.

There is a YouTube video about this section

The head control arm pivots around the centre of the ball, it needs to move sideways around the same pivot point and also allow the head to rotate.

The rotation of the head is driven by a 30:1 ComoDrills 918D motor and some 3D printed gears. Servos move the head sideways and eventually there will be an actuator to move it backwards and forwards:

I’ve added another Adafruit BNO055 IMU and also an I2C multiplexer so I can read from both IMU – check out the video above for more details:

I’ve built a 3D printed gearbox to move the head control arm front to back, although it’s driven by a 300:1 geared motor on the smallest gear:

The head control arm is also IMU controlled – check out the second video above.