At This 3D Printed Petting Zoo, the Mistakes Are Part of the Fun

Pip the Rabbit has a glowing belly and ears that wiggle when you press his paw. Inchy the Caterpillar crawls when you clap. Plate the Armadillo can curl himself into a ball, although getting him to do that took 11 prints. These are just a few of the residents of a very unusual petting zoo being built by a group of kids ages 7 to 13 for this month’s Maker Faire Bay Area in Vallejo, California.

There won’t be any real animals at the 3D Printed Robot Petting Zoo. Instead, there will be more than 20 creatures made with 3D printers, LEDs, motors, buttons, gears, and plenty of trial and error. And yes, visitors are supposed to touch them. In fact, the young makers want people to press the buttons, turn the switches and watch the animals move. Many of the creatures can also be opened so visitors can see the wires, gears and electronics inside.

But the kids are bringing something else to Maker Faire too: all the stuff that didn’t work. Broken prints, melted parts and earlier versions will be on display next to the finished animals. Visitors can ask the young makers what went wrong, how they fixed it, and what they would do differently next time. And that may be one of the most interesting parts of this zoo.

From a 3D Print to a Robot Pet

The idea behind the project is to make sure each young maker chooses an animal, either real, mythical, or completely made up, and decides what it should do. Then they have to figure out how to make it happen.

Some design their creatures from scratch. Others start with an existing 3D model and change it. They may cut it apart so it can open, redesign sections to make room for electronics, or print the same piece again and again until it works. Then, once the body is ready, they add a trick. That could be an LED, a servo, a motor, a button, or a set of gears. The goal isn’t to build an advanced robot. It’s to take something that would normally be a static 3D print and make it do something.

The beauty of this exhibit is the wonderfully different results the students created. The zoo has eight creatures, including Ember the Dragon with its articulated spine and two LED eyes that turn on with a button on its chest. Glow Jelly is a translucent blue jellyfish with a ring of LEDs inside. Lumi the Duck doubles as a nightlight, with a tap on the head changing the brightness. Cog the Owl doesn’t need batteries at all. Visitors turn a hand crank to make the gears inside his chest move. Then there’s Inchy, a caterpillar made from 12 printed sections, powered by an Arduino Nano, a small servo, and a sound sensor. Clap your hands and Inchy inches forward. Pip the Rabbit has a print-in-place body, an LED belly, and ears controlled by a servo. Press his paw and the ears wiggle.

Skipper the Turtle hides wheels and a small geared motor under his shell and moves with a wired remote. And Plate the Armadillo uses a hidden cam-and-lever mechanism to curl into a ball and open again. Plate apparently wasn’t an easy animal to build; it took 11 prints to get him there.

Print. Fail. Fix. Print Again.

That number, 11, says a lot about what the kids are doing. Some of them are working on projects like this for the first time. The official Maker Faire listing describes the group as fourth- and fifth-grade young makers exploring how simple electronics and mechanical movement can bring a 3D printed object to life.

It’s really great to see that nobody is pretending everything works on the first try. The zoo’s website makes that clear. The kids pick an animal, design and print it, and then add lights, motors, gears, or other parts to make it move or react. If something doesn’t work, they fix it and try again. That might mean sanding a part, changing the design or simply printing it again.

Anyone who uses a 3D printer knows how much trial and error can go into a print. And these kids are making things even harder for themselves. They aren’t just printing animals to put on a shelf. Their animals have to move, light up, or respond to people, which means the printed parts also have to work with motors, wires, gears, and electronics.

Please Touch the Animals

Maker Faire Bay Area takes place September 25 through 27 at Mare Island in Vallejo, California, and the Robot Petting Zoo is being built as a hands-on exhibit. That means there won’t be much standing behind a rope and looking at the finished prints. Visitors will be able to push buttons and test moving parts. And they can talk directly to the kids who made them. The makers are expected to explain not only what their creatures do, but what went wrong while they were building them.

It’s truly a great way to introduce kids to 3D printing and robotics. There are no perfect parts required and no need to understand everything before starting.

By the time Maker Faire opens later this month, the 3D Printed Robot Petting Zoo should have more than 20 of the cutest residents ready for visitors.