I’ve discussed the Braille device in detail, but until now there’s been no running examples – so I thought I’d upload a video of it in action.

The video shows the stepper motor in action, and how the gears move from Braille rod to rod (removed to show the gears underneath).

One thing you might notice right away – the speed. Working with Acrylic, while visually pretty, is not good for fast movement as it flexes too much. Also, since this is the prototype, I’m going slow-but-working versus fast-but-jamming (the driver chips really heat up when the motors stall).

In any case, I’ve gotten pretty well all I can from the Acrylic model prototype, and now it’s time for prototype 2. So here’s the (possibly only) video of the Acrylic model in action – enjoy!