Brown School of Engineering.Īn open-access study in Advanced Science outlines the process by which Preston and lead author Faye Yap harnessed a spider’s physiology in a first step toward a novel area of research they call “necrobotics.” Rice graduate student Faye Yap with a deceased wolf spider. While the power bank is for powering the Raspberry Pi.“It happens to be the case that the spider, after it’s deceased, is the perfect architecture for small scale, naturally derived grippers,” said Daniel Preston of Rice’s George R. Side note, there are two power sources on this robot the li-po battery pack is for powering the servo motor. While putting batteries in parallel will add up the capacity.

Putting batteries in series will add up the voltage. This makes it a 7.4v 1400mAh batter pack. Each li-po battery has a 700mAh capacity. Then it is connected by another identical set in parallel. They are a set of two 3.7v li-po batteries in series, which makes it a 7.4v battery pack.

If you are curious on how the four li-po batteries are connected. This mean the servo motor that controls Calf 3 (the 3D printed part) connects to the 0 port on PCA9685. To give an example on how to read the table, first row reads Calf 3 to 0. On where each servos should be connected to the ports of the PCA9685 servo driver. I did not show the complete wire up of servo motors in the diagram, because it will be too messy. Keep in mind the video is a guide, you can switch up the order of assembly if you want, however, you should always test the circuit first. Some sanding of the 3D printed parts might be needed in order to fit some parts together. First part is hooking up the circuit to test servo motors. The assembly video guide can be split into two parts. I can recommend the 3D printer that I use, this one is a real workhorse: Īdditional tools that you will need: soldering iron, heat shrink tubes, electrical tape, zip tie, pliers, hot glue gun, and screwdriver. You will need a 3D printer or access to 3D printer to print the body parts of the robot. Amazon // Banggood (if you are unable to get this battery then get a similar size one with capacity around 700mAh) 1 x LM2596 Buck Converter, DC-DC step down module.

1 x PCA9685 16 Channel 12 Bit PWM Servo Driver.

1 x POWERADD 5000mAh Power Bank (needs to be this one or similar size).

Here is the bill of materials with links provided for you to make this robot: As mentioned above all of the electronics are readily available on Amazon or Banggood or even your local hobby store.

Spider robot video