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He's cleaner than a hamster, and has more personality than most reptiles, and is much smarter than this dog I used to have. Plus, he's made out of junk and is lots of fun to build.
The human population can be (and arguably should be) divided into two groups: those of us who take apart hard drives, and those of us who do not. I sit squarely in the first group, alongside my two aspiring-mad-scientist sons. Perhaps we should be given an island somewhere, so we don't disturb the rest of the populace? At least until we take over the world via some sinister super-laser... BWAHAHAHAHAHA... but I digress.
As most HDTA's (Hard Drive Taker-Aparters) have discovered, you can't get a hard drive motor to spin continuously using a battery or other DC source, because it's a stepper motor that uses a controller on the hard drive's circuit board for a high-speed spin. But you can get the motor to jerk from one pole to another by connecting one terminal of a battery to one of the motor's three terminals, then poking a wire from the other terminal of the battery back and forth between the other two hard drive terminals. Useless? Of course! But this is the phenomenon that gave birth to Twitchy: a self-motivating randomly-switching boingy apparatus, whose own random motion contributes to more random motion. Measurements and specific materials aren't very important here, so feel free to improvise!
The human population can be (and arguably should be) divided into two groups: those of us who take apart hard drives, and those of us who do not. I sit squarely in the first group, alongside my two aspiring-mad-scientist sons. Perhaps we should be given an island somewhere, so we don't disturb the rest of the populace? At least until we take over the world via some sinister super-laser... BWAHAHAHAHAHA... but I digress.
As most HDTA's (Hard Drive Taker-Aparters) have discovered, you can't get a hard drive motor to spin continuously using a battery or other DC source, because it's a stepper motor that uses a controller on the hard drive's circuit board for a high-speed spin. But you can get the motor to jerk from one pole to another by connecting one terminal of a battery to one of the motor's three terminals, then poking a wire from the other terminal of the battery back and forth between the other two hard drive terminals. Useless? Of course! But this is the phenomenon that gave birth to Twitchy: a self-motivating randomly-switching boingy apparatus, whose own random motion contributes to more random motion. Measurements and specific materials aren't very important here, so feel free to improvise!
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Signing UpStep 1Materials, Tools
Materials:
Hard drive motor
24-36" scrap Cat-5 network cable.
12" insulated, stiff copper wire (thickness doesn't matter much)
Wire clothes hangar
6" Fishing line
5V power supply
Small "zip" ties
Eyeball, hair, or other personality-enhancing items
Tools:
Torx wrenches
Pliers: standard, needle-nosed
Vice grips
Wire cutters
Wire strippers
Soldering stuff
Hot Glue gun
Hard drive motor
24-36" scrap Cat-5 network cable.
12" insulated, stiff copper wire (thickness doesn't matter much)
Wire clothes hangar
6" Fishing line
5V power supply
Small "zip" ties
Eyeball, hair, or other personality-enhancing items
Tools:
Torx wrenches
Pliers: standard, needle-nosed
Vice grips
Wire cutters
Wire strippers
Soldering stuff
Hot Glue gun
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The human population can be (and arguably should be) divided into two groups: those of us who take apart hard drives, and those of us who do not. I sit squarely in the first group, alongside my two aspiring-mad-scientist sons. Perhaps we should be given an island somewhere, so we don't disturb the rest of the populace? At least until we take over the world via some sinister super-laser... BWAHAHAHAHAHA... but I digress.
As most HDTA's (Hard Drive Taker-Aparters) have discovered, you can't get a hard drive motor to spin continuously using a battery or other DC source, because it's a stepper motor that uses a controller on the hard drive's circuit board for a high-speed spin. But you can get the motor to jerk from one pole to another by connecting one terminal of a battery to one of the motor's three terminals, then poking a wire from the other terminal of the battery back and forth between the other two hard drive terminals. Useless? Of course! But this is the phenomenon that gave birth to Twitchy: a self-motivating randomly-switching boingy apparatus, whose own random motion contributes to more random motion. Measurements and specific materials aren't very important here, so feel free to improvise!
So wait, let me understand this, the pendulum is connected to the - (negative) side of the motor, and the 2 loops are connected to the + (positive) side of the motor? Is that right?
When Twitchy is twitching properly, you never have to touch the pendulum: that's the idea. When there's enough voltage pumping through (my latest improvement clocks in at 12V!) and the contacts are clean, Twitchy will run indefinitely because the pendulum is always rockin'.
I can't definitively answer your +/- question because I never took the time to figure out which is which for this project, mainly because it doesn't really matter: the point is, the pendulum is connected to one terminal on the motor and the two loops are connected to the other two (there are usually three or four terminals on these motors, not just two). The wiring decisions were made in a highly scientific manner: I poked at the motor with the leads from a battery and noted what caused the motor to jerk back and forth...
Might I suggest checking out the contact loop idea (courtesy of my co-worker, Russ) that I used in Twitchy II Dancing Wireman, which employs "Ring terminals..."
Thanks!
Mike
sorry for the bad video quality but i had to coompress it because i couldn't wait all day for the video to upload because it slows this dinosaur down.
i didn't have googely eyes at the time so i just duct taped some paper one one.
he twitches for alot longer now after tweaking the weights, almost 5 mins now
USB would absolutely work; I only went with the wall wart because Twitchy was already only like 2 feet away from Robo Rooster, so it was convenient to steal power. Stuck to the computer is more poetic, actually.
An additional bonus: the proximity of your working hard drive to the mangled one will undoubtedly provide a sufficiently threatening atmosphere for your computer so that it won't dare step out of line, for fear of being twitchied.
Mike