Motorised faceplate mechanism

This page is about the motorised faceplate, check out the main project index for
the rest.

Here's a YouTube video about the faceplate and eye lights, or scroll down for the written version
with pictures

I decided that it would be pretty cool to motorise the faceplate for my Iron Man helmet, just like
in the movies. This is how I've decided to go about it, I'll be adding more updates and a video to
this page as I finish the helmet up.

Firstly I cut the faceplate off one of my casts, the 'widows peak' part snapped off whilst I was
doing so, so I glued that back on and reinforced it with a piece of aluminium - this will need to be
quite a strong piece as you'll see:
I'm using two standard sized servos for this, and some custom linkages that I made from
aluminium:
These are attached to the 'widows peak' of the helmet and will also attach to the faceplate. This
allows both angles and motion to be controlled. I found this was a bit wobbly, so I added another
linkage on the other side of the servos, which is made from aluminium and two HDPE blocks
with machine screws to make the hinges:
This gives a good range of motion, and although I could have used smaller servos, the helmet
still fits me and my eyes are at the right height:
Some primer and sanding/filling/painting, just need to sort out the electronics and line it with
foam:
 I've made a nice foam liner around the seam line of the faceplate, this means it has something
to rest/fit against when it comes down. I've done some testing with a Pololou Mini Maestro servo
controller controlled by a Picaxe18 for now. This is the same as Android 11.