Science Buddies: "Ask an Expert"

Hello! My 2nd grader and I have built "Flippy, the Dancing Robot" successfully! Meaning its "legs" or motorized popsicle sticks both moves. BUT, when we put the robot on a hard surface (rug, counter, floor, etc), the "legs" do not seem powerful enough to lift the robot and move around, so it stops. We used the motors from the "Bristlebot Robotics Kit," and are wondering if they are not powerful enough? We will experiment with shortening the legs to see if that helps. Any other tips or ways to problem-solve? Thank you for hosting this forum and considering our questions!



Moderator note: https://www.sciencebuddies.org/science- ... cing-robot

Hello,

Unfortunately this project will not work with the motors from our bristlebot kit. Those motors spin at very high speed (which lets them spin a cork around to make the brushbot robot vibrate), but have very low torque (the strength, or how hard the motor can spin/push on bleep). So they are not strong enough to lift the weight of the robot when the popsicle sticks push on the ground.

As shown in the materials list of the project: https://www.sciencebuddies.org/science- ... #materials, the dancing robot is intended to be built with these gear motors: https://www.jameco.com/webapp/wcs/store ... =Avantlink

Those motors have internal gearing that slows the motors down, but increases torque (there is a tradeoff - if you increase one, you decrease the other). This makes the motors slower but stronger, so they can push harder to make the robot move around.

Note that you can also purchase the yellow motors from our partner Home Science Tools: https://www.homesciencetools.com/produc ... s/?aff=SB1

and they are also included in our BlueBot kit:

https://www.homesciencetools.com/produc ... t/?aff=SB1

Hope that helps!

Ben Finio, PhD
Lead Staff Scientist
Science Buddies

Thank you so much for your attentive and thorough response! We are gonna roll with it