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A
good picture of Stephen with Herbie and his
friends, Beauregard, Daisy and their dog Duke...
Of
course, a few of Herbie's early trophies are
also on display! |
Of
course, every time there's a holiday, Herbie
insists he gets dressed up. Here, for
Halloween, he poses as the bad Herbie
which appeared in the film
Herbie Rides Again. |
And
then there's the special guest appearances such
as the the Toy's for Tot's campaign at Channel
9, WFTV in Orlando. You can see how much
Stephen really hates these shows... |
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As
for the bears, they start off as a simple frame
made from balsa wood and plywood with a few
pieces of brass tubing formed to make the arms,
legs, mouth, etc.. Speakers are added so that
they can speak.
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Each head contains 4 servo
motors that control the ears,
the mouth and the head
tilt independently |
The
lower body contains 5 more servo's to control
the arms, legs and head rotation. Notice the
lead counterweights used to reduce the loads on
the servos. |
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On
the back cover are mounted the Mini Serial Servo
Controller boards (each board controls up to 6
servo's). Since Bo was #1, he has 2 mini SSC's
which he shares with Daisy. Ribbon cable is
used to control the wiring.
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Duke is very similar in construction. He
has 5 servo motors to control both ears, the
head tilt, his tail, and his tongue which goes
in and out. |
The
presentation had to be just right so that the
bears would not block Herbie. Here, a number of
different heights were experimented with to see
just how well they would work.
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Wooden stands were eventually used to give the
bears just
enough height. They are also
used when the bears are sitting
in the back seat so that they can
see out Herbie's back windows. |
A
laptop computer was added under the front seat
to control the mini SSC's/servo's and to provide
the sound track for Bo and
Daisy. A software program by Brookshire allows
up to 128
servo's to be controlled simultaneously. |
The
user interface is very simple. The waveform
(bears dialog) is on bottom and you simply drag
and drop the start/stop command for each servo
above it to get the
desired result, i.e., raise arm,
open mouth, etc.
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The
original master controller was replaced with a
master servo assembly that is controlled by the
laptop computer. Like before, it's output
controls Herbie's movements. |
The
new master servo assembly
is verily simple. Inside there
are 5 servo motors, a mini SSC,
2 relays and 10 mini switches.
The servo's are used to activate
the switches as required. |
The
end result is always the same. Here at Old Town
in Kissimmee, FL, the crowd already begins to
build... |
