Remote & Head Dolly

Star Wars EP7 BB-8 Droid VERSION 2

This page is the Controller and Head Dolly, check out the main project index for the rest.

There is a YouTube video about this section

The head will be magnetically coupled to a motorised arm within the droid. I looked at various roller balls for running the head on but unless you buy expensive Omnicaster branded casters they have quite a lot of friction. I decided to 3D print my own wheels with Ninjaflex rubber tyres. Of course these are casters so they can run in all directions, but I’ve also included a rotating centre so that the head can rotate without all the casters having to change direction.

A pair of magnets, each with opposite poles facing upwards, holds the dolly onto the head and will allow the internal mechanism to guide it around. Hopefully large wheels will provide minimal friction – check out the video above for more explanation.

The controller is Bluetooth to match the droid, the Bluetooth shields are set to pair with each other during power up. This way I can build in my own custom buttons and expansion, and also write a smartphone app to control the droid some day if I wish: