Design of Low-cost Desktop Robot Based on 3D Printing Technology and Open-source Control System

Under the background of “Made in China 2025” strategy, more and more vocational schools in China have been setting up industrial robot majors. In robotics courses, 3 to 6 students share a robot because of industry robots’ high price. The design of a low-cost desktop robot based on 3D printing technology and open-source control system has been proposed. The robot’s 3D model was built by SolidWorks software. Most of the components were manufactured by using 3D printing technology. Ultimately, the components printed by 3D printer, motors, sensors and other elements were assembled by screw connection. Also, the control system based on the open source Melzi circuit board and Marlin firmware was designed. The direct kinematics and inverse kinematics equations were added by changing the initial codes in Marlin. Experiments have demonstrated the applicability of the design.