DEMOGORGON MINIDANCERS
A project based on Arduino
Arduino-based mini robots that react to the central notes of the piano using a KY-037 sound sensor and 2 servo motors.
A BRIEF OF HISTORY
This was a project that I made for the OnStage category of the Mexican Tournament of Robotics, part of the Robocup Junior 2026, which will celebrate in Puebla in a few days. We defined the theme of the performance to be Stranger Things, but i didn´t had time to see the series, so, from what little i know i defined that my idea was to build a couple of animatronics made with recycled or cheap materials and with easy command prompts.
So I define that the robots will be connected in a serie, to avoid the use of more money in buying more batteries. But the main problem was the activation process of the motors via microphone. I solve that problem fixing a medium rated frecuency in the KY-037 module, using a piano keyboard with 440Hz in the A4 tune.
MATERIALS
Here are the components you need:
- 1 Arduino Uno R3 or similar,
- 1 USB A to B wire,
- 1 breadboard,
- 1 sound sensor KY-037 module,
- 2 servo motors SG-90,
- An energy font of 6V (4 AA batteries for example)
- A package of male-to-male jumper wires and female-to-male.
CONNECTIONS OVERVIEW
This code can be loaded to the Arduino Uno board media a program called "Arduino IDE", you download it from this page "https://www.arduino.cc/en/software", open a new file and there put this code, then connect the USB to your pc and Arduino Uno and click on the upload button (an arrow pointing to the right).
For calibrating the sensor you just put a flathead screwdriver into the yellow screw on the blue box and spin it, if you spin it clockwise you amplify the radium of sounds that it detects, anti-clockwise you decrease it. You need to adjust it ´till the light below the blue box is off.
CONNECTIONS CHART
Power Supply (4 AA Batteries):
- Negative -> breadboard negative
- Positive -> breadboard positive
Servomotor 1:
- Yellow/orange wire -> Arduino Uno pin 2
- Red wire -> breadboard positive
- Brown wire -> breadboard negative
Servomotor 2:
- Yellow/orange wire -> Arduino Uno pin 3
- Red wire -> breadboard positive
- Brown wire -> breadboard negative Breadboard
Sound Sensor (KY-037):
- A0 -> Arduino Uno pin A0
- G -> Breadboard negative
- POSITIVE -> Breadboard positive
LIMITATIONS
Actual limitations include that from what i´ve seen you need to calibrate it every time you use it, the only 6V alimentation and that you need a quiet place for it to work properly.
Next improvements will be that it will move the arms.
STRUCTURE
For assembling the structure, you can use a printed papercraft template glued to a piece of moderately thick cardboard.
SEE ALSO
Here´s another robots i made with my team: