Finished WALL-E robot showing the complete assembled chassis, arm, and collection bin

Ongoing

Real-Life WALL-E Robot + SPAN Robotics

Autonomous litter-collection robot built from scratch—custom 3D-printed chassis, servo-driven arm, Jetson Orin Nano vision stack, and PS5 teleoperation. Documented publicly as the "Day X building real life WALL-E" series and now the foundation of SPAN Robotics.

Robotics Autonomous Systems Computer Vision Rapid Prototyping AR

📰 SPAN Robotics 📰 Build log posts on X (@mohr_zachary)

3D models of the robot: V0 (initial prototype) and V1 (current build).

Day 1 post outlining project intent and early CAD baseline for the robot arm

Day 1 (Jan 30): project goal and initial architecture, including the pivot from complex stepper/CNC controls toward a simpler servo-based arm.

Day 2 post showing three.js arm simulator controlling a physical prototype

Day 2 (Jan 31): three.js web interface drives arm kinematics and streams joint values to the ESP32 over serial.

Day 3 post showing chassis CAD with revised steering architecture

Day 3 (Feb 1): chassis redesign pivoted to a single front wheel approach for tighter steering and better internal packaging.

Combined Day 4 and Day 5 post showing printed chassis parts, bevel gears, and electronics planning

Days 4-5 (Feb 3-4): printed chassis components, integrated custom bevel gearing, and planned electronics packaging around Jetson Orin Nano plus microcontroller control.

Day 6 post showing first chassis drive tests with PS5 controller

Day 6 (Feb 6): first successful chassis control test with PS5 teleoperation through ESP32.

Day 7 post documenting power and wiring debugging during integration

Day 7 (Feb 9): resolved servo power brownouts by rerouting servo 5V supply to a regulated rail and planning a dedicated 12V-to-5V board.

Day 8 post showing first successful manual trash pickup

Day 8 (Feb 17): first successful trash pickup during manual operation, validating end-to-end mechanical feasibility.

Day 9 post showing real-time trash segmentation and detection output

Day 9 (Feb 19): computer vision milestone using YOLO segmentation trained on TACO to detect trash regions and compute grasp-point centroids.

Finished WALL-E robot front view showing the arm, chassis, and collection bin

Finished build: front view of the completed robot with arm, custom bevel-gear drivetrain, and onboard collection bin.

Finished build: side profile of the fully assembled autonomous litter collection robot.