The point of the "robot arm" in this video is to continuously tap the screen of an iPhone in order to prevent the phone from turning off (like sleep mode), without actually having to touch the phone with your finger every minute or so. You can walk away from your phone, allowing the game to continue on. It's like setting up a macro for a computer game to keep it doing something, cheating at the game basically
It is powered by USB and uses conductive foam on the tip of it to react with the touch screen of the iPhone.
It uses no board, it is composed of what appears to be simply a servo motor and a usb cable.... where do I obtain a servo motor that moves like this?
Hi, how do you know what it is connected too, all I see is the servo working tapping the screen.
It looks like a switch in the end of the arm detects when it has touched the screen.
The end does not have to be conductive, these touch screens use pressure between transparent screen layers and their resistance to indicate an operation.
An arduino and servo would be able to do it.
"Hi, how do you know what it is connected too, all I see is the servo working tapping the screen. It looks like a switch in the end of the arm detects when it has touched the screen."
...Where I originally found the item, it shows it powered by simply a USB end.... it can be plugged into your computer for 5 volt power.
"The end does not have to be conductive, these touch screens use pressure between transparent screen layers and their resistance to indicate an operation."
...Yes, the iPhone screen must have a conductive "thing" touching it in order to control the touch sensitive screen (i.e. why your finger works, and styluses work, but not a piece of plastic or rubber.) The early touch screens used pressure sensitive response between screen layers, but they were much less sensitive than the new technology.
You could do that very easily with a DC motor/gearbox and a crank - I don't see the need for any electronics. Since the forces involved are negligible you could just make it up out of bits of wire - it looks to me like a five minute job to get something working once you have the parts.
TomGeorge:
The end does not have to be conductive, these touch screens use pressure between transparent screen layers and their resistance to indicate an operation.
If that were so, multi-touch gestures would be impossible.
The screens are capacitive.
Anti-static foam is a pretty good fake finger/cheek/ear
The anti-static foam is a conductor. It allows the "capacitance" of your body to affect the screen - for example if you use a "pen" for the screen instead of your finger.
If the foam is attached to a machine where will it get the "capacitance" to trigger the contact with the screen? Perhaps the foam will need to be connected to ground?
