PatStarace


wp_redirect( $http://www.patstarace.com/?p=454 );
exit;


Help me help a child!

It’s been too long since I made my last kids hand “The Iron Man Kids Prosthetic Hand” and I’ve been wanting to help this cause again.  Kids without a hand cannot hold virtual reality controllers and play some of the awesome games like Vader Immortal, Beat Saber, Robo Recall, and also use many of the fun learning games. I wanted to solve that by creating a cool prosthetic hand for kids that was functional, really cool looking and would raise kids self esteem to “The Force!”. This glove was designed in Maya, Solidworks, ZBrush and 3D Printed on a Raise3D Pro2 Plus using all flexible materials, so it’s squishy soft, yet firm enough to hold the controllers which is great for swinging the controllers around to play Beat Saber. It also has an action index finger to play games like Robo Recall. In the end, the Vader Glove came out better than expected and I can’t wait to put it on a young child.

Please click this link to request the Darth Vader VR Glove.

Since forever I’ve wanted to own a small Jet Engine and build something cool, have some fun and explore the physics of a turbine.

I started by purchasing a Jetcat 220RXi and I had the unboxing at the university where I am a professor. It was a great surprise to all my students and colleagues when I slowly removed all the supporting components from the box and then finally revealed the jet engine.

The unboxing.

I wanted to fire it up and hear what this little beast sounded like so I built a sturdy test bed. The Jetcat RXi idles at 35,000 rpm and maxes out at a a whopping 130,000 rpms. In this video I only had the nerve to take it up to idle as my hands and knees were shaking. It was an exhilarating experience.

I wanted to put this into something real cool, and I decided to make a Jet Powered Kids Batmobile. Where to start? I purchased a Kids Batmobile and scoped out how I could pull this off. It had to be durable and have a high performance level, so I decided to design and fabricate a chibi racing go kart frame out of Chromemolly tubing and racing go kart parts. This had to fit within the cool plastic kids batmobile and not distract from the design intent. the batmobile was 3d scanned and I used this for reference for my Solidworks design of the frame. It all came together better than expected and here’s a video of the first run (taking it easy) at the Orlando Maker Faire.

The sound is absolutely amazing!

More build pics to come.

Hop on this custom Mario Kart, put on the headset, grab the custom Oculus Rift Touch Controllers and go head to head with DK, Bowser, Toad and the rest of the gang in this fun-filled tech preview. The custom controllers allow you to transition from holding the steering wheel to throwing bananas at you opponent.

This VR Experience is based on a custom built X-Wing Helmet with an integrated GearVR Headset and mobile roomscale tracking. The Lightsaber is custom built and complete with integrated tracking. The user puts on the helmet and headset, grabs the lightsaber and they’re inside the Millennium Falcon ready to take their Jedi Training skills to the test and don’t forget to “Use The Force”.

Everything has to start somewhere, and for the E.T. Virtual Reality Flying Bike Project it was locating an authentic  Kuwahara KZ BMX Bicycle (The same Elliot rode in the movie).

Much more on this to come.

Imagine you have to save your little extraterrestrial friend by putting him in a mike crate on your bike and pedal him to safety. That’s what I wanted to recreate, but as a Virtual Reality experience.

THE BICYCLE
There were many parts to this puzzle, and the first was to research what type of bicycle Elliot had used in the movie. E.T. The Extraterrestrial was released in 1982, and what I found out was, Elliot rode a Kuwahara KZ1, and it was a REAL production bike, so I set out to try and locate one. I started scouring the internet and it was fascinating how popular this bike was and still is. Some searches returned sky high prices for a restored E.T. Bicycle, some bikes are in museums, and others are kept for personal collections. I thought I’d have to settle on an old KZ1 frame, all rusty from sitting outside that I’d have to do a lot of work to restore it for this project, when I found somene that had an authentic Kuwahara KZ1 re-issue for sale… still in the box! BAZINGA!!! I stopped what I was doing and grabbed this gem. (picture above).

THE MILK CRATE
Elliot’s bicycle had a very characteristic milk crate attached to it, and I wanted this very look. I began searching the internet again this time for a circa 1970’s/1980’s milk crate. I found out that in the movie the crate was painted white, so I knew I’d probably not be finding a white one. After many days of searching I found one that was close but not an exact match, so I ordered it. I continued my searches with hope that I could find the exact one, and the searching paid off, I found the exact style milk crate as in the movie!

When I first received my GearVR, knew I wanted to do something cool with it and what better than an augmented and virtual reality magic wand experience. I started by deciding on the functions of the hardware in the wand, and the software functionality in the game. I wanted players to experience Dementors attacking them as they could see the real world around them, and then magically enter a castle and continue the fight. A mix between Augmented and Virtual Reality would be the route I’d take. The next phase consisted of simultaneous development of the wand, electronics, and the software.

Here’s the wand being 3D Printed at Full Sail University on our Stratasys Polyjet Connex II. For flexibility the wand was printed with a mix of Vero White and Tango Black+, the tip was printed with Vero Clear, the end cap with Tango Black+, and the electronics housing in Vero Clear.

The finished 3D Print.

Testing the haptic feedback circuit. Not pictured is the arduino,/bluetooth module and the circuit board fabricated on a LPKF.

The software was developed using Unity3D with a Bluetooth connection to the wand. In Augmented Reality the player sees the REAL environment around them which Dementors frightfully appear. Wherever you look there’s a gaze dot, and you aim the dot on the Dementor and flick the wand to banish the Dementor… till the next one. As a player holds a magical card a 3D Castle appears. It can even be rotated to see a small battle inside the castle walls. By staring at the castle, the player is transformed to Virtual Reality and they are inside the castle walls and the battle continues.

Since building this, hundreds of people have been able to play this Mobile AR/VR Experience.

Samsung Gear VR (2015) Retail Mod for Note 4

VR is here, and it’s here to stay. It remind me of the “Wild West” days that 3D software packages had decades ago. Companies like Softimage, Maya, 3D Studio Max, and Lightwave were all “Shooting Out” for a stake in the claim, and it was very exciting to see the technology advance. Roll forward and this is happening again with every large company investing in the VR Headset market. What happens when the technology moves this fast is some get left in the dust. I have been developing and creating content with a Samsung Note 4 with the Samsung Gear VR (Innovator Edition) for quite some time. I was excited to hear of  the new Gear VR (2015) Retail Version, but was disappointed to learn that it wouldn’t support the Note 4.

I picked up the $99 release version and wanted to take a closer look and see if a mod could make this work with the Note 4. The (2015) Retail Version has spring loaded pins that support four different phones (Samsung Edge6, Edge 6+, Note 5).

After taking some initial measurements, it looked like the Note 4 was about 2mm to big vertically, and it would fit on the horizontal.

I already knew the headset would fire up from earlier tests when I plugged the phone in to the headset and even though it was on a angle and wouldn’t fit in, I did see the phone start up with the Gear VR App.

I thought I could easily use a Dremel to remove enough plastic to make it fit as I’d only have to remove approx 1mm from the top, and 1mm from the bottom. The tricky part would be to Dremel and not cause any damage to the spring loaded pins. Tape was used to prevent plastic shavings from getting inside the unit.

I used an exacto knife to hold the pins down as I dremeled away at the plastic. Slowly I dremeled away at the plastic and did each of the four corners. I also dremeled away in the middle.

After cleaning up the edges with an exacto knife, it was the moment of truth and see if this works. I put the Note 4 into the newly modded Gear VR, and it worked. The first thing I noticed was it was brighter than my Original Innovator edition. The camera correction isn’t perfect, the video seems a little large, and there are some ripples in the stitching, but overall this thing ROCKS!!!

SoftRobotic 5 Sided Gripper. This robot is an adaptation of PneuNets and the amazing work from the Harvard Whitesides Research Group. The SoftRobot is a Multi-Material Pneumatic Actuator and is powered by a small air pump. The process is completely automated using an Arduino, air pump, solenoid valve, and a stepper motor. The SoftRobot can easily lift the Sphero (18.1 grams). To assure even wall thickness and reduce blowouts, five molds were designed and 3D Printed.

The Iron Man Mark IV Hand has been deployed to Iron Kid. The Mark IV has the same functionality of the Mark III plus many new High-Tech Features. The goal was to help a child by giving him the most awesome hand. The Mark III Hand was given to “Iron Kid” Tyler on his eighth Birthday and seeing him put it on and light it up made this one of the best days of my life.

Iron Kid used his new hand for awhile, and it came back for an extensive upgrade to the Mark IV Hand Armor. Tyler’s relatives were concerned that he wasn’t exercising his hand enough, and I thought it would be a great addition to add a Mobile App that could integrate with a Game Controller like device right in his hand. Therapy Game Play that’s fun to do I say. The game app is in the initial development, but all the hardware is in place. There’s also a nifty Control Panel App that allows diagnostics and control of the hand. It also has a Remote Alert System that lights up the repulsor and vibrates the hand with haptic feedback, so Iron Kid will never be late for dinner. Many new High-Tech and fun features were also added including, more info to come…