Robotics Science Projects (Page 6)

Science Fair Project Idea

Engineering Design Process

Do you like making paper airplanes? What about origami animals? Have you ever thought about making a paper robot? In this engineering project, you will make a three-dimensional robotic gripper that starts out as a single flat sheet of paper! Try it out—see what objects you can pick up with the gripper, then see if you can improve the design. Read more

Make Soft Robotic Skin

Science Fair Project Idea

Engineering Design Process

When you think about robots, do you think of something made from metal? What if robots could have stretchy, flexible skin just like humans? How would they detect when someone tapped them on the shoulder or something rubbed against their arm? In this project, you will learn how to make artificial robotic skin using flexible rubber with an embedded conductive fabric. You can also connect the artificial skin to a microcontroller and use it to control outputs like LEDs or motors. Read more

Motorizing a Robotic Hand

Science Fair Project Idea

Scientific Method

Imagine how cool it would be to have your own motorized robot hand. Well, stop imagining and turn that daydream into reality! Start out by designing and building a robot hand. The Science Buddies project Grasping With Straws: Make a Robot Hand Using Drinking Straws shows you a simple way to make a robot hand with drinking straws, or you can design a robot hand from any other materials you think are suitable. Your hand design will need sewing threads, or some other mechanism, for motors to… Read more

PID Controller Tuning for a Drone

Science Fair Project Idea

Engineering Design Process

Note: to do this project you will need the DIY Mini Drone Kit, available from our partner Home Science Tools®. An Arduino must be purchased separately. The Electronics Kit for Arduino, available from our partner Home Science Tools®, contains the additional parts you will need, including an ultrasonic sensor. The program in the DIY Mini Drone: Arduino™ Altitude Control project uses a proportional controller to control the drone's altitude. A potentiometer is connected to one… Read more

Racing Bristlebots: On Your Mark. Get Set. Go!

Science Fair Project Idea

Scientific Method

Have you ever wanted to build your very own robot from scratch? Bristlebots are a cheap, easy, and fun-to-build robot made from the head of a toothbrush, a battery, and a small motor. Once completed, they buzz along the top of a table like bugs. How can you make a bristlebot go faster? In this project, you will build bristlebots from two different types of toothbrushes, and race them against each other to find out. Read more

Racing Drones: Does Practice Make You Faster?

Science Fair Project Idea

Scientific Method

Have you ever flown a drone? Did you find it easy the first time you tried? In this project, you will fly a drone through an obstacle course and measure how practice changes your performance. Will practice help you finish the course in less time? Try it out! Read more

SeaPerch: An Underwater Robot

Science Fair Project Idea

Engineering Design Process

Underwater robots, or remotely operated vehicles (ROVs), help us explore areas of the ocean that can be dangerous for humans. They can provide valuable scientific information about deep-sea life and ocean climate. However, you do not need access to the ocean to build and test your own ROV. If you have ever wanted to build your own ROV but were not sure where to start, the SeaPerch platform is a great option. You can purchase a complete kit with all the required parts and follow the detailed… Read more

Should My Robot be More or Less Squishy?

Science Fair Project Idea

Scientific Method

In our introductory VoxCAD project, we provided a template with four materials: two active materials that expand and contract in the physics sandbox mode, and two passive materials — one hard and one soft. The project mentioned material properties, but it did not go into much detail — you just used the default settings from the template. Changing the material properties can drastically change how your robots behave. Engineers must take material properties into account when designing… Read more

Soft Robots with Built-In LEDs

Science Fair Project Idea

Engineering Design Process

Check out the soft robotic gripper and artificial robotic skin projects. These projects show you how to use flexible silicone rubber to make robots or robotic parts. The second project shows you how to connect external LEDs using an Arduino. The LEDs light up when an embedded piece of conductive fabric stretches. What about embedding LEDs in the silicone rubber? You can do this by embedding the LEDs between layers of silicone (Figure 1). The trick is to solder flexible stranded wires to the… Read more

Squishy Robot Simulator

Science Fair Project Idea

Scientific Method

What do an octopus, an elephant's trunk, and an earthworm have in common? They are all squishy, bendable and flexible because they do not have any bones inside. You might not typically think of robots as "squishy," but scientists are increasingly trying to create soft robots that look and move like animals. In this project you will use a "soft robot simulator" to design and race your own squishy robots. Can you come up with the fastest design? Read more

Robotics Science Projects (68 results)

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