Author: Steven Edwards
Date: 09:07:31 10/25/04
Here's a picture of a robotic arm kit from Lynxmotion that would be suitable for playing with a small chess set: http://www.lynxmotion.com/images/index/l6arm3.jpg The spec sheet for the US$380 serial port version is here: http://www.lynxmotion.com/Product.aspx?productID=4&CategoryID=25 Some short movies are here: http://www.lynxmotion.com/images/video/mmcs.mpg http://www.lynxmotion.com/images/video/mvc-249w.mpg http://www.lynxmotion.com/images/video/mvc-251w.mpg The main limitation of the arm is its workspace radius of about 20 cm, followed by its lift mass capacity of about 80 gm. An arm suitable for a tournament set (as the DGT board/set) could be made from the company's catalog by substituting higher torque servomotors and a scaled up version of the Lexan frame. The higher capacity servos go for about US$120 each and so would significantly add to the cost. Also for a tournament arm, the needed reach of about 50+ cm and 120+ gm lift would certainly require a modified base that was much larger, heavier, or anchored in order to retain vertical stability. I think I could build a tournament arm as described above for about US$650 of Lynxmotion parts plus about US$150 of other source parts. Although the cost per unit would be less with a large production run, I don't think there's that much of a market for such an item at US$500+ prices.
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