As I get closer to designing a teleoperated robot that I can actually build, I wanted to experiment with different robot arm designs. Hence I took the re-design of a couple days ago and made several re-designs out of it in turn.

In this first version, I deleted the camera at the base because the robot already has a camera. I also changed the claw servo from radial to linear. I’m not sure that was such a good idea, but there we go.

Here I got rid of the back-arm and compensated by extending the fore-arm. I might need a counterbalance now for the fore-arm.

Always vigilant to cut out costly servos, I eliminated the ability of the wrist to turn clockwise/counter-closewise. The claws can still tilt and pick up stuff and punch buttons. Maybe it’s not so good at pulling throttles.

Doing away with one more servo. I tilted the claws as a compromise angle because the wrist angle is now fixed. (My attempt to make the claws stand out more with different coloring seems to have backfired.)

Here’s an unconventional variation. No radial servos, just linears — and only three are required, though the design looks complicated at first sight.

Here is a second view, from underneath. Think of the silver bars as sliding along the black slots, and you can see how this works in three dimensions. I don’t think I’ll ever build this one, however, now that I see how it looks. But that’s the beauty of Sketchup.