Robot Costume Hack

Since Halloween is just around the corner we’ve built and published a few projects in order to give some ideas to the DIY costume-inclined folks. One is DIY Halloween RGB LED Kitty Ears and two is Halloween LED Witch Hat. … Read more…

DIY Halloween RGB LED Kitty Ears

Simple cosplay cat ears made out of Fosshape, decorated with rhinestones and complete with RGB LEDs for color changing effect. Materials: Fosshape 300 2 x slow scroll RGB LEDs 2 x CR2032 coin cell batteries 2 x coin cell battery … Read more…

Golem at Calgary Comic Expo

Solarbotics has worked on a good many interesting costuming projects, but few have been as unique as Shannon Chappell’s Rock Golem. Shannon did a fabulous job repurposing electronics for the Golem, and if you’re trying to do the same, be … Read more…

3D Printed Treetop Star

Initially inspired by the Moravian Star on Instructables and the fact that we now carry all kinds of 3D printing filament, we decided to make one of our own glowy holiday star. We have used this thing as source files … Read more…

Project Monday: Laser Monitoring with Synapse

I’m Dilan, a relatively new hire here at Solarbotics, and I am in charge of product development and R&D support. I’ve got tons of experience with many things, and have seen Arduino as a staple in many projects here at Solarbotics. With its ease of use, powerful programming language, and vast online community, it has been the go-to platform whenever a quick solution is needed. But when I needed some wireless communication, I’d choose a system like Xbee/Zigbee or even simple 433MHz modules, where the communication interface was still treated as a dumb serial link between the two systems. With Solarbotics’ use of Synapse, I needed to project to get to know a more advanced wireless system.

Solarbotics has been playing with Synapse SNAP modules, and have featured these modules in various projects in the past, like our our wireless Brutusbot and with a tutorial on how to get started with Synapse. This system has potential, and it was time to bend it to my will!

Read more…Project Monday: Laser Monitoring with Synapse

Project Monday: Musical Gears

Sometimes we get the opportunity to help out select people who are developing projects for a good cause. One of those things dear to our hearts is inspiring children with science and electronics. So when John Porter came to us … Read more…

Project Mon(Tues)day: Pinewood Lowrider

Jerome, our squiggly-bearded intern from many moons ago that created the BeetleBot, just pointed us towards this totally pimpin’ pinewood derby car. The author from sliptonic.com shows how he made his sweet lowrider with hydaulic(esque) action by using a small … Read more…

Original Robosapien Prototype

Well, we’re all back from Maker Faire, feelin’ pretty groggy but fairly alive (or, perhaps more accurately, undead – something about being in a zombie-like state sounds about right). So to break the recent drought of news posts, we’ve dug … Read more…