RFVplotter – Drawing robot

Last Updated 9 November 2024

The design files and code for this project is now available. https://github.com/aliasmeum/RFVplotter-DrawingRobot

I will eventually update this post with a little more information on the build.

My first inspiration to make a Vplotter style drawing robot was seeing the robot made by Niklas Johansson and Lars Aurtande at Oslo Skaperfestival 2019 (Oslo Maker Fair 2019).

This was the first time I saw someone use drone motors to get more pressure on the pen while plotting in a vertical position.

My version of the Vplotter

I decided to make a 3D-printed design from scratch and have been through a few iterations, but here I will only present the current version of the plotter. The plotter is running g-code on a Raspberry Pi. It uses a simple but powerful Vplotter control, originally developed by Herbert Roider. I have adapted the program to add a hardware PWM-control for a BLDC-motor. To generate the g-code files I am using Fusion360 and Inkscape with the gcodetools extension.

TODO: Video of plotter

Here are a few photos of the robot at the science center in Kristiansand, and at my local science center in Arendal.