My Pneumatic Animatronic Character

[poison]

Very Cool!
I know Bruce and have been to his Haunt when it was at his house 2 years ago. Did he go PRO last year?
He has AMAZING DETAIL in his Haunt.
I look forward to seeing a video of your robot in action : }

[The Mad Hatter]

When you say pro haunt. Yes it is taken in a professional manor. I would not call it a big and detailed haunted house like most people have. I believe it actually sucks right now, That is my belief but I am used to movie quality sets. Sets that cost $300,000.00 Plus to make. But for the haunt industry I believe they work just fine.
Its different now than it was at his house 2 years ago, you should swing on by this year and check it out. Its going to be around 8,000 Sq feet.

-Frank Balzer
FrankWillisBalzer@yahoo.com

[kpolley]

Man, I just stumbled onto this and I am blown away. I can't believe the time, effort, and money you have put into this. It's amazing. I can't wait to see the finished product. Excellent work so far. Very impressive.

[The Mad Hatter]

Thank you for the complement, It means alot.
Here are some photo updates of the animatronic with air hose attached. Bruce can be seen in the photo taking a photo. prop is over at his house temporary. Eyes for wings are finished but not attached yet.

[The Mad Hatter]

Here are a few photos of the finished eye mechanism's for the wings. also shown is the eye mechanism for the head. It should be finished by tomorrow.

-Frank Balzer
FrankWillisBalzer@yahoo.com

[The Mad Hatter]

The animatronic head is almost done.....a bit more aligning to do and installing.... here it is sofar.... its a bit dirty....

The head has 15 servos in it. 2 control the eyebrows. 6 control the eyes and eyelids. 1 controls the nose. 3 control the upper lip, 2 control the lower lip. and 1 makes the jaw go up and down...... I wanted to add one servo for the eyebrow ridge and 2 for the cheeks, but I have no room for them.

[The Mad Hatter]

It has Been a while since I have updated this forum on my project. I have recently finished the 15 servo controlled head. I wanted to add 3 more servos in it, 2 for the cheeks, and one for the eyebrow ridge. I have no room so they will not be added. I am rather disappointed about that. I also got the airline set up on all the pneumatics. I will weld the 16 eyes on the wings tomorrow. and hopefully get around to making servo wire extenders the following Monday. The final count for movements is......
26 pneumatic cylinders, 15 servos for the head. and 48 servos for the eyes on the wings = 89 movements. john at efx tek http://www.efx-tek.com/index.html is building the controller.....It will run off of a 1/2 a terrabit laptop I bought. It will be programmed with visa in about 2 weeks. The audio will hopefully be done by my friend mike fox at http://www.nightfrights.net/ ................... I am rather behind on the sculpture and will need to work on it this weekend.

Frank Balzer
FrankWillisBalzer@yahoo.com

[The Mad Hatter]

more photos.

[shawnc]

Frank

This is just amazing. When you first started this project I thought you were going to build a head with a few servos and didn't think it was going to be anything that special. But this is just amazing.

Shawn

[The Mad Hatter]

I honestly though It was going to be a small project as well. It has been fun working on it so I just decided to go ahead and make it a little bit more. I am hoping to make a job out of doing this type of work in the near future when I am older, still only 20 .... stuck in purgatory between a teenager and an adult! I would not call it amazing though. After working on this first animation of mine I have learned what not to do. There a a countless number of flaws in it! welds, rubbing, hinges wearing, servos burning out, these are some of the many problems I will see in the near future. I am worried that I may not get this guy up and running. I hope there will be nothing to worry about.

-Frank Balzer
FrankWillisBalzer@yahoo.com