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Robot Valentine

View the video on Youtube

two hearts (with convenient easy-grip handles)

Ned has a new friend! The HiWonder Xarm is a fun little educational robot which you can buy assembled or in a kit. We thought it would be fun to see if the Xarm is repeatable enough to perform in a video alongside our Niryo Ned. It did very well for the price; at one stage, I needed to reteach some points that “wandered” for some reason but other than that it’s a great little robot. Note, the Xarm is really more of a 5-axis than 6-axis robot; the 6th axis is the gripper jaws, which does limit some of the positioning but Ned was able to work around this.

For props, I designed a simple heart shape with a grip and printed it on our FlashForge Creator Pro. Resized for the smaller heart, repeat. Slicing done on Simplify3d.

In any setup where pre-stage is the locating method, it’s important to know where your robots & parts are. I used a couple of plastic grids which are inexpensive and reusable; they’re sold as quilting accessories.

Using a grid for repeatable prestaging

We repeated the exchanging-of-valentines action over two dozen times; occasionally it didn’t work out (there was some variability where Ned put down the small heart, and occasionally the pencil stuck in his gripper jaws), but overall I was really happy with the sequence. The video featured on RoboFiesta’s Youtube channel was shot on a Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G, which has awesome media production capabilities. Edited on Adobe’s Premier Pro.

Will you be my robot valentine?
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Mecademic Diode Load

Precision diode load

With 5um repeatability, the Mecademic 500 is uniquely suited for applications requiring a high degree of precision. Prestaging of components is key, however, when using purely motion with no vision or dynamic location. The CanaKit Raspberry Pi breadboard provides a good stage for this work, which could be adapted for backloading & soldering manufacturing applications. Watch the video here.

Battered Diode

Word of warning- have a few “burner” parts for use during setup. Once the diode legs get bent they are difficult to straighten!

It’s difficult to see, but the robot performs a “shimmy” action as it places the 2 diodes. This utilized the Mecademic’s ability to jog in very fine increments when building the program- in this case, 0.05mm and finer. This motion was to offset the variance in prestage presentation of the diodes, and the spring memory in the fragile diode legs. The program is included below.

Meca-Diodes-Working


Meca 500 placing diode
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Precision vs Accuracy

Ok, this one may not be completely intuitive, but there is a difference between precision and accuracy in the world of robotic motion and robotic-aided assembly and manufacturing. A common way to think of the difference between the two is the dart board analogy. As shown below, accuracy can be thought of hitting the exact mark you intended to hit- the very center of the dart board. Precision can be thought of as hitting the same spot every time- repeatability, but not necessarily in the exact spot you intended.

One dart in the exact center is accurate. 3 darts in the same position off-center represent precision.
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RoboFiesta Blog

The webs best resource for robotic kit reviews, building, testing and more.

Are you someone with a passion for robotics? Do you want to learn more about robotics or find out how you can use robotics in your everyday life? Then welcome, to RoboFiesta, your one stop resource for robotic kit reviews, building, testing and more. We’re not here to overwhelm you with technical talk or bury you in lines of code and commands. Instead, we simply have one goal in mind, and that’s to make robotics fun for everyone! Whether you’re a beginner in the robotics field, have years of experience or just want to tinker around, we’re here to show you how to get started and to create fun projects.

So, what will this website feature? Well, here’s a brief taste of what’s to come:

Robotic kit reviews.

How hard are they to build? What can you do with them? Are they value for money? We will purchase kits, build them, and then review the build, the quality, the value of the kit and whether or not you should invest in it.

Robotic kit builds.

A step by step look at the build of the robot kits. This covers any problems that we ran into during the build and how we solved any problems during said build.

Robotic Projects.

Now that you’ve built your robot, what are the types of things you can do with it? From the cheap to the expensive robots, here’s some projects and ideas you can use to fuel your own imagination.

All of the above and more….

We’re not sitting on our laurels her at RoboFiesta. We’re working hard all day every day and coming up with fun and exciting projects. So keep checking back to find out what we’ve managed to come up with next. Remember, the whole point of RoboFiesta is to explore robotics and have fun with what you learn. Are you ready to join the Fiesta?

RoboFiesta, the best place to have fun with Robots!
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Mecademic vs Anyone Else

Sure, there are dozens of contenders in the industrial desktop robotics category, but for professional-grade speed and precision, the Mecademic Meca500 is the hands-down winner. At just over 10lbs with nearly 13″ of reach, it’s diminutive size allows for easy transport and set-up in situations where space is restricted. The quality of construction is apparent right out of the box; it’s a serious, well-constructed machine with an on-board software interface which allows for rapid set-up and use.