Silicone Butterflies From a Dispenser Mounted Robotic Arm

This project is created as a course assignment at the California State University, Long Beach; taught by Behnaz Farahi: DESN 551: Materials, Tools, and Techniques of Prototype. This project was made in collaboration with Anabel Cardenas and Jinny Choe

In this project, we created butterflies through a dispensing system located on a UR10E Robotic Arm.

Supplies

As a dispensing material, we decided to use silicone. Its low viscosity makes it an easy material to work with in the dispensing system as there will be a lesser chance of clogs. We had a choice of an arrangement of different needle sizes, allowing for different amounts of output. In addition, we tried a series of various dyes to add color.

Step 1: The Machine

To dispense our silicone, we used a Universal Robots UR10E robotic arm and a dispensing kit by Fancort Industries all made available through our college department.

Step 2: Rhino and Grasshopper

To control the toolpaths of the robotic arm, we used Rhino 7 and Grasshopper. In Grasshopper, we used the Robots plug-in to communicate with the arm and the Parakeet extension to utilize complex patterns in our designs.

Step 3: Visualization

Rhino allows us to view the patterns created through Parakeet as well as the outline of our butterfly. This program acts as a visualization tool prior to turning on the robotic arm.

Step 4: Creating the Butterfly Outline

To control the area of the pattern and contain it within our butterfly outline, we used a series of functions in Grasshopper.

Step 5: First Tests

Initially, we inserted a Sharpie in the dispenser mount. When the robot ran through its actions, it would show the entire path the robotic arm would take. After gaining confidence with this test, we started dispensing silicone on cardboard to get the right outline, pattern, and scale.

Step 6: Layering Colored Silicone

After going through our first tests, we realized that we could stack different colored silicone within the dispenser. As our robotic arm would run, the color dispensed would leave a nice gradient from color A to color B. Due to this, we could plan for the outline of the butterfly to be one color and it would shift when creating the pattern.