Brush Bot Tinker Day at the Camera Obscura Building

Last Saturday, the fabulous Jen Fox and I had a Tinker Day at 1450 Ocean (the Camera Obscura building) in Santa Monica.  We used inexpensive and recycled materials to make brush bots.  Dollar store electric toothbrushes are a great source for materials, as they include a motor, battery, and other reusable bits.

 

Camera Obscura Building Setup

 

Check out a video of our fun!

 

 

Jen cut off the head from her toothbrush (and a couple others), and created a bristle bot built around a balloon and housing from a solar lawn light.  Balance was precarious at times, but when it fell, we discovered that it was good at breakdancing too.

 

Balloon Brush Bot

 

My brushbot was built on a spoon from Yogurtland, and stood on three golf tees.  I tried to keep it as minimal as possible otherwise – motor, battery, and wires.  For a switch, I stretched the wires out into arms and hooked them together when I wanted it to run.  And, of course, the bot requested eyes.  I couldn’t bring myself to refuse.

 

Brush BotBuilding the Brush Bot

 

We also created a couple bots made from bamboo skewers, one of which included a 3d printed mechanism to give the movement a little more wobble (see the video above).

 

As we decided to forgo pre-made battery packs and switches, there was a lot of experimentation of how to effectively hook up and control power to our bots.  We have used electrical tape to secure wires to a battery in the past; this time we tried using hot glue, metal pieces left over from the toothbrushes, coins, and balloons.  Keep an eye out for my upcoming Instructable detailing our different approaches.

 

Battery Connection