I have braces! Which are horrible. There are many positives
- I can't eat anything, I'm losing weight!
- I brush my teeth after anything I do manage to eat - shiny teeth
- I can't bite my nails
- The dentist gave me a model of my teeth
I dunno if my dentist saw a crazy glint in my eye when he showed me the plaster model of my teeth or if its standard practice to give them away: but he gave me the model of my teeth.
And of course I just had to make a robot out of it.
The model has these points at the bottom that were perfect for attaching to some acrylic. This was a great opportunity to learn how to use a digital callipers for accurate measuring and use my laser cutter for the first time this year
I started by just bunging it all onto a Kitronik motorboard
Then realised I needed to put the big heavy battery somewhere! I made the chasis longer to hold the battery and a third wheel.
I added a servo to the back to open the mouth of the model and a neopixel inside the mouth that would glow red when the mouth opened!
Watch the robot being driven here:
https://twitter.com/LMcUnderwood/status/1087119163078963201
I realised the battery was weighing down the third wheel too much.
I redesigned the chasis so the teeth would sit in the front. Work in progress here:
And now it drives a lot better!