Max Imagination has published the making of a DIY spherical robot that moves by rolling inside a transparent plastic ball. It’s meant to entertain pets, explore tight spaces, and be driven via smartphone, like an FPV drone that rolls on the floor. The project uses an XIAO ESP32S3 Sense from Seeed Studio, which includes Wi-Fi, a 2MP camera, a mic, and a microSD slot.
Two geared motors allow moving and steering, drawing power from a lithium battery and controlled through a motor driver IC. A sliding switch is used for simple power control. Using Flux, two custom PCBs were designed: a main control board for the electronics and an LED ring light board around the camera. The structure comprises a chassis, wheels, and a casing, all 3-D printed using PLA and TPU filaments. The designs were made in Autodesk Fusion 360. A transparent ornament ball is used as the outer shell.
The build uses motion detection to set off video recording, which can also be manually triggered. The videos are stored on a microSD card. A web app can be accessed to control the robot, view live video, and adjust its settings. It connects to a phone or PC through its own Wi-Fi hotspot. The assembly includes adding LEDs for head/tail lights and adding weights for balance. Arduino IDE and a codebase called ESP32 Cam MJPEG 2SD from GitHub are used for its programming. While not waterproof, the tiny robot exhibits serious mobility on grass, carpets, tiles, and sand.
