Jenny 5 is an (almost) humanoid robot intended to be used mainly for research but also as a human assistant. More details about Jenny 5 can be found at: https://jenny5.org/ or https://jenny5-robot.github.io/.

Jenny 5 was inspired by the Johnny 5 robot from the Short Circuit movie. This a great movie that anyone must see.

Jenny 5 has a mobile platform with tracks, a pliable leg, two arms with 7 degrees of freedom each and one head.

All source files (CAD, software etc) for Jenny 5 are freely available on GitHub. All code is released under MIT license so that anyone can freely use it in both personal and commercial applications.

Jenny 5 is easy and cheap to build. Most components can be purchased from robotics stores. Custom made parts can be printed with a 3D printer. Some aluminium profiles can be cut and drilled with tools available for hobbyists.

Materials (excepting the computer) cost about 2500 USD (please see the bill of materials for more details).

Jenny 5 is designed in OpenSCAD which is a CAD software where you write instructions, instead of using the mouse, to create objects.

Robotic Architecture

Jenny 5 is a complex multi-nodal system.

The Platform: Uses tracks for high stability and traction in outdoor environments. Driven by 2 DC motors with 50:1 planetary gearboxes for high torque, controlled by a RoboClaw board.
The Leg: A unique pliable design using 2 linear actuators that allows the robot to adjust its height and maintain balance on uneven terrain, also controlled by a RoboClaw board.
7-DOF Arms: Each arm uses 6 stepper motors with 27:1 gearboxes. High precision is achieved via AS5147 Magnetic Rotary Sensors, which provide absolute position feedback. Motors and sensors for each arm are controlled by an A-Star 32U4 Mini board.

The gripper is powered by a servo motor. The gripper is connected to the same A-Star 32U4 Mini board as the entire arm. The gripper has attached a webcam used for recognizing objects closed to it.

The head has 2 degrees of freedom ensured by 2 stepper motors which have magnetic sensors attached for reading the position. The head has a webcam for object detection and an ultrasonic sensor for distance measurement. All head components, except the camera, are connected to an Arduino Nano board.

The entire robot is powered by 2 LiPo batteries: one for platform and foot and one for arms and head.

Software & Control System

A-Star / Arduino boards run a specially crafted firmware called Scufy which is able to control multiple stepper motors and read a variety of sensors: buttons, ultrasonic, potentiometers, infrared, LIDAR etc. This custom Arduino firmware acts as an abstraction layer between the hardware and the high-level PC software.

PC software is built around several libraries which send commands, on a serial port, to A-Star/ Arduino boards and to the RoboClaw controller.

The robot can be operated in Remote Control mode via a smartphone interface or programmed for Autonomous Navigation. Each joint is PID-tuned for smooth movement, with the feedback loop running on the local microcontroller nodes to minimize latency.

Commands are transmitted via a WebSocket Server from a browser-based HTML5 client to a control PC (usually a laptop or SBC) mounted on the robot. The robot can be manually controlled by an HTML5 application running within browser on a smartphone. The HTML5 application connects with a server running on the robot. The server is the one that actually execute the commands(move, read sensors) etc. The server is built on a top of a light WebSocket server.

Computer Vision: Utilizes OpenCV for spatial awareness and object recognition via the integrated webcams in the head and grippers.

Having all these elements, the robot can be utilised in a wide range of scenarios. Here is a short list of things that the robot could do (if programmed correctly):