Today, Ive made up one of the hero lage using my popstick prototype
as a guide. Its out "leg" proper is 3x1 on its side with a 70mm hinge at
the knee and one 70mm hinge at the other end for it to join onto the
body. I welded 2 m8 bolts to a piece of steel rod to make the lower links-
its lower end swings back and forth in an m8 nut welded to the end of
some m10 pipe-Clamps currently hold the top and bottom links to the
robot with some wood and metal spacers. All I need to do is sort upper
and lower mounts to fix it to the robot.

The hero leg seems to move nicely, lifting its foot, throwing it out and down
then coming back level in the bootom part of the throw. Ill make up the other legs next then the center sponson and axle and go from there!
Ill endeavour to have some more pics up early in the week time permitting!
Jas

Well Its been a crazy few weeks for me that did leave me not being able
to anything on the um, big spider, but the small spider, yes now theres
two, is alive and perambulating!

Angus did get a shot of it on his camera to post-but its not up just yet, well
see if we cant rectify that over the weekend, but hell be coming along next
weekend to strut his stuff

For now, though I can say that building a smaller version has answered many
questions I had in my mind-and pointed me to some concepts which Id
like to incorporate into the big spider. Ill cover those at a later time.

It weighs around 1.2kg i think now. it has over 300 parts in this one and
36 points of articulation. V1.0 was driven by 4 servomotors, V2.0 is driven
by a pair of tamiya gearboxes putting out 809gm torque at 1cm. Each
box drives a four leg module, the two modules are joined by an upper and lower chassis plate. Electrics sit on the lower plate with the batteries on top
for now-ill move those inboard. It is made of aluminium and plastic.

I have fitted ceramic caps to the motor cans and taken an earth lead back
to the servo boards-it was getting some rf noise when i first tested
it, but the mods seem to have responding well to the radio now. This
had to be done as the legs need to be quite loose at the joints-loose
metal banging together can generate rf noise.-but the upside of the
loose joints is that it allows the robot so settle all four legs down firmly
with each step.

Those little gearboxes surprised me with there speed and power. It walks
a treat, reminds me of the facehuggers from alien! - like the mondo
spider it kinda scrabbles along in weird, sea sick kinda way thats cool at
the same time, My concerns about how the robot might change direction
were quickly displelled as well. Not only does it does it turn happily on the
spot but it u turns as well. ive put optical encoder wheels on the gearbox shafts so I can Play around with some feedback and pic chip control.

Hes got this really really cooooll noise when he walks-the big bot should
be lot of fun. Ive named my spiders Gramul,The Many!-a spider
from the second book of the never ending story-Im planning a few
fun mods and additions to it, And it may just have one other cool
feature to show off next week!-thanks for dropping in on the spiders!-
Now Ill see if we cant get one damn pic up here
-jas

Jason's prototype, walks fast and is bloody cool!
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YEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH

Do you have a video of it walking?
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So even the rain that falls isn't actually going to fill our dams and our river systems

Nope. Not as yet anyway.
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YEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH

A video would be very cool, or at least a few close-ups of the legs in different positions. Looking at the quality of work in that model, I am kinda glad Jason is so busy making movies - he would annihilate the competition if he had more bot building time.
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Australian 2015 Featherweight champion
UK 2016 Gladiator champion

:DThanks Nick!-glad you like it, also thanx to Angus for getting that pic up!
Well see what we can do about a video to watch over the next week, but im sure we can get some shots up over the next few days showing some
leg detail and the different leg positions and gaits(I should mention that
the legs seem to be okay with walking in any pattern) so far-Im going to
test it now to seen if can get over a shallow obstacle, say a thick book
on the floor-well see what happens!

Ive got some flat chrome panels on the legs now, im going to
add a lightweight "abdomen" and "head" to get a little more of the
spider look happening for next week! Now I just want to see about
getting that last special feature into him!-Jas

Well Happy New Year to everyone!-Hope you all had a great break!

Well,here miles below the earths crust, in my secret lab, Im planning
Gramuls rebuild!

Hes lived up to what I wanted in my first walker, but as I had suspected
the leg joints are now getting a little loose(threaded bolts through
aluminium holes you see!) so tightening them up doesnt help.
I knew it would have a limited life without bearings in the joints-
thatll be part of the rebuild. I have a design for a new leg which has
an extra link driven joint, or foot joint, which may allow a slightly higher
step-should prove interesting (more bloody pieces, oh well,hes
got around 600 seperate bits now-whats a few more!)

Ive got the Optical encoder wheels on him now and ive trashed another
mouse for its sensors-Im planning basic pic control after the rebuild
with a view to making him autonomous to some degree-and that
special feature I mentioned should also be on the rebuilt bot-
whats a spider-without WEB spinning ability!!!???? stay tuned-
And thanks for everyones kind words about Gramul-Even if we end
up never having walkers in the arena thats ok!-Theyre just to much
damn fun to make!!-Jas

You might be interested in this leg mech motion...

http://www.teamonslaught.fsnet.co.uk/leg%20mech.htm

Hey Woody!-Thanks a lot for passing that little mech sample to me-Ive
not come across one remotely like that one-if Im absorbing that right,
the foot moves through a flat plane at the bottom of its stroke!?-Ill whip
up a little model of it and see how it works-If I get a model working, ill
post it up!-jas

Yup ...It is a fairly flat plane.

The originator of the concept is no longer into Robots... and I have had this motion sitting around on my harddisk for around 6 years ... I think it deserves to be made.