There’s a New Humanoid on the Block
declares on its very first page that
“Robophilo is not a toy.” It just goes
to prove that intellectually intensive
and brain stimulating robot projects
can be so fun that there might be
some confusion, so we’re glad that
the distinction has been made.
The Robophilo instruction manual
gives the directions on how to build
the bot with clear text and helpful
3D illustrations of the step-by-step
assembly. The pictures are very nice,
but the detail on the page, the
background watermark, and the
length of the manual ( 78 pages!)
discouraged us from printing it out.
Following along on the computer,
however, proved to be easy enough.
The brackets for the arms and
legs of the Robophilo are certainly
reminiscent of those used on the
Robonova and Bioloid, and this tried
and true design works just as well on
the Robophilo. These parts are made
out of lightweight plastic instead of
metal as one of the money saving
measures on the kit, but the quality of
the parts do not appear to suffer for
the sake of economy.
One thing that the Robophilo has
that its competitors do not is its own
set of tools. This simply consists of a
crosshead and a hex head screwdriver,
but one hugely helpful detail about
the crosshead screwdriver is that it
is magnetized. This proves to be
invaluable when dealing with so
many tiny screws.
Other aspects of the Robophilo kit
that set it apart from it contemporaries
are the inclusions of silicone grease
and rubber o-rings — the robot’s
substitute for synovial fluid, if you will.
The Robophilo also uses some smaller
servomotors in conjunction with
some small metal push bars for the
movement of the head and waist. An
unfortunate distinction is that a very
small number of steps demand the
judicious use of some super glue,
which is not included in the kit. But by
planning ahead and having some super
glue at the ready, this minor detail
shouldn’t mess up your building flow.
One problem that we encountered with the Robophilo construction
was with the actual casings of the
PHILOMOTION CREATOR.
servomotors. The casings, like most
others for various servos, have little
tabs on the side with holes for
mounting. We figured that the
Robophilo made use of these
tabs, but we were mistaken. The
illustrations in the instruction manual
and the pictures of completed
Robophilos on the box show servo
casings sans tabs, so we had to chop
them off. Perhaps this was a manufac-
turing oversight that will be corrected
for future kits, but the tabbed casings
are only a minor setback that we
easily corrected after some quick
surgery with a hacksaw.
Other than that, the Robophilo
went together relatively easily. All of
the plastic parts have part numbers
directly on them for reference, and all
screws and other bits are stored in
conveniently labeled bags (except for
the fact that some of our bags were
labeled in Chinese, the parts were
very easy to keep organized). At the
end of most steps, rough tuning is
ROBOPHILO FINETUNING.
SERVO 07.2008 59
