Phil's veho360 Speaker Mount on a Propeller BOE Robot

[Ken Gracey]

Hey there,

About two weeks ago I called Phil Pilgrim on my way home on a Friday afternoon with a little challenge: figure out a nice mount for the veho360 speaker on a PropBot! Both of us thought it could be a very simple laser cutter project. By Monday Phil had a FedEx package on the way with the final design. Wow! Now I have the perfect test platform for his upcoming speech synthesis work on the Propeller. If customers are interested we could make a little kit that includes these parts, too. Keep in mind there are many ways to mount the veho360 speaker on a Boe-Bot using Phil's design. I chose to drill a couple of new holes in the chassis front, one inch apart. My example is shown at the bottom of this post.

Here's a snippet from Phil's message.

I designed a bracket for those little hamburger speakers. It turns out that the bellows is plenty stiff to hold the speaker both vertically and horizontally. The bracket just snaps into the middle bellows fold, and the speaker can be rotated to any angle. I think the attached photos are mostly self-explanatory. To fill in some details:

1. Material is 1/16" black Delrin. Mine took 14 seconds to laser cut (35W). 1/16" acrylic could also be used. (1/8" material is too thick.) Hole spacing is 1".
2. The round standoffs are 1" x 0.25" (4-40), which I believe you stock. They are tall enough for the bottom of the speaker to clear the surface by about 0.1". For vertical mounting, one or both standoffs can be used.
3. The clips for horizontal mounting are stopless 3AG screw-down fuse clips (Keystone #3567). BTW, these are really handy things to have around. I use them all the time for mounting stuff to the BOE-Bot.
4. They grip the standoffs tight, yet it's easy to adjust things by sliding the standoffs through the clips.

So the complete mounting kit would consist of:

1 ea. laser-cut bracket
2 ea. 1" x 0.25" (4-40) round standoffs (nylon or aluminum)
2 ea. Keystone #3567 stopless fuse holder clips
4 ea. 4-40 x 1/4" PHMS
2 ea. 4-40 nuts

Thank you Phil for doing this project. Additional photos and drawings from Phil are attached to this post. You are free to use them as you wish. Let us know if you are interested in getting these parts in a little kit - maybe I could find somebody in the office to put it together for us.

Ken Gracey

[Duane Degn]

While I like this design, I think it places the breadboard too high to use sensors that are normally connected via the breadboard.

I'd think wiskers and IR sensors will be harder to mount at a useful height while using this setup.

Edit: Do you care which way the speaker is facing? I might try my hand at a design.

[Ken Gracey]

Duane, sure, let's see some more options. This speaker is quite loud and I think it could also use the lay-flat arrangement where the standoffs screw directly into the chassis. That would reduce the clearance required by up to an inch.

I've been thinking about what I'd do with the space behind the speaker and I'd add a wireless video transmitter and a cup to carry M&Ms. Without batteries the configuration I'm showing above is front-tipsy.

Ken Gracey

[Jessica Uelmen]

Carry M&M's, eh? Looks like someone else is invading Kevin's stash! ;]

Back on topic, it's a very slick design, Ken was showing this off in the office on Monday. Nice job, Phil!

[Ken Gracey]

Duane, Phil and I accepted your challenge and came up with a modification that doesn't require any raising of the PropBOE, or interference with sensors on the front of the breadboard. Plus - it reduces the parts requirement down to almost nothing (a piece of delrin, two spacers (or standoffs) and two screws. An easier method than what I'm showing would be a shorter spacer with two screws that thread from the speaker delrin into the back (board side) of the VGA connector. Check this out and tell me if you like it any better.

Ken Gracey

[mindrobots]

Ok, now for the next design iteration, can you somehow mount the spring clips to the speaker so it can clip onto the standoffs which could then stay permanently attached to the db-15? This way you could snap the speaker off if you wanted to get to anything underneath it.

[Edit: .....unless there isn't anything of interest under the speaker on the PropBOE....in which case, ignore this entire message! ]

[Ken Gracey]

Ok, now for the next design iteration, can you somehow mount the spring clips to the speaker so it can clip onto the standoffs which could then stay permanently attached to the db-15? This way you could snap the speaker off if you wanted to get to anything underneath it.

Like this?

Wish I could do this kind of thing every day. Havne't been productive today but it's certainly been a great day!

[erco]

Looks good. I say jack the speaker, PropBoe and batteries up another two feet and make a balancer out of it!

[Phil Pilgrim (PhiPi)]

Ken,

In your latest configuration, will the cord still reach if you flip the speaker around so it's more centered over the VGA connector? There will be less torque on the VGA connector's solder joints that way.

-Phil

[Ken Gracey]

Ken,

In your latest configuration, will the cord still reach if you flip the speaker around so it's more centered over the VGA connector? There will be less torque on the VGA connector's solder joints that way.

-Phil

Yes, there's plenty of cord. Remember that the speaker can also rotate in your handy little delrin keeper, providing up to an inch more of cord if needed. There is no cord torque in any of these configurations.

So, what else can you do with these fuse clips, 4-40 screws and a couple of standoffs? Can you make something snazzy like erco showed up above? Can you build a boat? How about a rocket?

Ken Gracey

[Phil Pilgrim (PhiPi)]

So, what else can you do with these fuse clips, 4-40 screws and a couple of standoffs?

I sometimes prefer them to angle brackets, since they're adjustable. Here's an example with a TSL1401-DB mounted to the front of a BOE-Bot for line-following:



The camera can slide up and down in the fuse clips to adjust the field of view.

Of course, you can go totally Dr. Seuss with them, too:



-Phil

[erco]

Of course, you can go totally Dr. Seuss with them, too:

-Phil

Theodor Geisel would be so very proud.

[Phil Pilgrim (PhiPi)]

Here's a way to make a T-bracket with three of the clips and two standoffs:



Anything mounted this way will be adjustable in both pan and tilt axes.

-Phil

[Ken Gracey]

Getting crazy. Good thing you guys are spread apart by a thousand miles.

Ken Gracey

[Phil Pilgrim (PhiPi)]

Ken,

I'm sure Erco would move to P.T. in a flash if he knew about EdenSaw.

-Phil

[Martin_H]

What a great use for fuse clips! I never thought of coupling them with standoffs, but it works and opens up new ways to attach things.

[erco]

Ken,

I'm sure Erco would move to P.T. in a flash if he knew about EdenSaw.

-Phil

I'm sure P.T. is nice. We have a PT Cruiser!

After ferrying across from Victoria, I biked through Port Angeles, then my derailleur exploded in the Hoh rain forest. Nice, helpful people up there in Forks, but a tad too wet for my tastes.

I was a Forks fan long before the Twilight movies came along.

[erco]

Besides, I just saw this: http://news.yahoo.com/deadly-storm-g...212531042.html

[Duane Degn]

An easier method than what I'm showing would be a shorter spacer with two screws that thread from the speaker delrin into the back (board side) of the VGA connector. Check this out and tell me if you like it any better.

Ken,

I had just been looking at the VGA connector on my Demo Board to see how it could be used to hold the Veho360.

I figure the VGA connector isn't likely to be used while the Propeller Boe Robot is roaming around so the threaded connectors on either side could be used as an attachment point or the connector itself in conjunction with an end of an old VGA cord. Kind of like the Fluke device uses the serial port to attach to the Scribbler robots. You'd still need a way of connecting the Veho to the re-purposed VGA cord end.

I didn't pursue the VGA option because I was concerned the nice thin VGA connector on the Prop BOE might be damaged with the added stress of holding the Veho360.

So yes, I do like these versions better, but I worry about the stress on the VGA connector.

I haven't tried an old wire coat hanger yet but this is my bailing wire version (okay, it's not bailing wire, it's old phone wire).

[Phil Pilgrim (PhiPi)]

Duane,

The stress on the VGA connector is mitigated by the through-hole anchoring pins, but there are limits, I suppose. That was the concern in my post #9, since the weight (albeit minimal) was leveraged out a ways.

Erco,

Forks gets waaaay more annual precip than we do: 160" vs. 19". But mainly, just for you, we have EDENSAW!, a wood-lover's paradise. There are even a few palm trees in town (hardy Mexican fan palms). But, yeah, I spent more than an hour today brushing 8" of snow from my flat-roofed shop in anticipation of the freezing rain that's supposed to follow. Now I've got aches in places I didn't know I had places. Oh, also, the women are all bundled up this time of year. Any "tan lines" are probably just from windburn.

-Phil