Wall Drawing Machine Using Tripod and Polargraph

This machine is made to make large scale drawings on walls without fixing the motors directly into the wall, so we used tripod stands to hang the motors, and it`s running using Polargraph software.

This project is done by Beshoy Gamil & George Milad.
Polargraph controller Copyright Sandy Noble 2018. http://www.polargraph.co.uk/

Components:

Arduino UNO R3
L293D Motor Drive Shield
5V, 2A Power Supply
NEMA 17 Stepper Motor
MG90S Servo Motor
GT2 Pulley 16 Teeth Set
GT2 Rubber Belt (We used 9m for large drawings)
Tripod

To hang the motor on the tripod we designed 2 brackets, first one is fixed on the tripod itself & the second one is to hold the motor, and we connected them using an 8mm steel rod to adjust the distance between them.

You can get the 3d printing files from here: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:4931873

This gondola is designed to hold a pen with a maximum diameter of 20mm.

And it consists of 2 bearings that the GT2 belt will be attached, and a metal weight to maintain stability.

It's a simple polargraph connection.

And we used ethernet cables to transmit power and signal from the control box to the motors.

This upgrade explained by MERT Arduino is necessary to give your motors enough power to run.

1. Download "arduino-source.rar" from here.
2. Download and install Arduino IDE version 1.0.5 from here.
3. Copy the libraries in the file you downloaded at the 1st step to the Arduino libraries folder.
4. Open the folder "polargraph_server_a1" then open the code file "polargraph_server_a1.ino"
5. Connect your Arduino UNO then upload the code.

I made a modified portable software of Polargraph and it's compatible with Windows, Linux & Mac os.

To run it follow the steps:

1. Download "Polargraph by Beshoy.rar" from here.
2. Extract the file and open the suitable version for your operating system.

1. Open Polargraph software and go to the SETUP tab.
2. Click on SERIAL PORT then choose your Arduino port.
3. Wait for a couple of seconds until you see the top line of the main window turn green and show Polargraph READY!
4. On the top right section click on Command Queue to turn it to green color.

1. Set the MM Per Rev value according to the pulley and belt you are using. In our case, the belt is GT2 and the pulley has 16 teeth, 2x16 = 32mm.

hint: to set this value on the software click on the MM Per Rev and move your mouse upward and downward to change it. and use the same way to change the following values too.

2. Set Steps Per Rev according to the stepper motor type. in my case, the step angle of the stepper motor is 1.8 degrees so the value is 200 steps. This value is adjusted to 400 because we`re using 2 motors.

3. Set the size between two pulleys on the Machine Width.

4. Set the Machine Height.

5. Set the size of the area you will draw (Page width & Page height).

6. Set the Page Pos Y value 120.

7. Click Center Home Point and set Home Pos Y value 120.

8. Adjust servo angles (Pen up position, Pen down position) and click test lift range to test the values you entered, and after that click on UPLOAD LIFT RANGE.

9. Click on UPLOAD MACHINE SPEC to save the data you entered.

10. To save the machine specs you entered to use it later click on SAVE AS and to load it next time click on LOAD CONFIG.

1. Go to the INPUT tab in the software.

2. Adjust the gondola manually to the center between the 2 motors and to be lower 120mm than them.

3. Click on Set home.

4. Find any vector drawing image and convert it to ".svg" format.

5. Then select Load Vector from the software.

6. Adjust image size with Resize Vector.

7. Move the image to the desired area with Move Vector.

8. Then adjust the area to be printed with Select Area and Set Frame to Area.

9. Finally, click the Draw Vector command to start drawing.