Robotic Arm

Overview

A from-scratch 4-DOF robotic arm built to learn how real industrial arms handle backlash, compliance, and load. Translating that into a working build pushed me into actuator sizing, joint architecture, and basic motion control.

What I worked on

• Designed and 3D-printed all structural components for a 4 degree-of-freedom arm.
• Sized actuators against required torque at full extension.
• Wrote Arduino firmware for keyboard-driven control with simple homing routines.
• Iterated on tolerances and bearing fits until the motion felt deliberate, not sloppy.

Takeaways

The arm taught me to respect compliance. Every joint adds slop and every link magnifies it. The fight against compounding error is most of what real robotic-arm engineering actually is.