Robotic Arm for Arduino Coding Programming 6DOF Hiwonder-xArm1S STEM Educational Building Robot Arm Kits, 6 AXIS Full Metal Robotic Arm Wireless Controller/PC/App/Mouse Control Learning Robot

Surprisingly well designed and performant
Opening up the box, all the parts were neatly packaged and undamaged. The quality of the anodization on the metal parts was surprisingly good and I liked how there was decent organization of screws and other small parts into separate bags.Assembly was pretty quick and straightforward (took a bit to get to the instructions) with no issues of fitment so QC seems to be good as well. Came with spares of most things and love the serial bus interface of all the servos, will probably switch to them for a lot of my future projects. One caveat is the included screwdriver isn’t that useful since you’ll need a smaller one for all the screws on the servos themselves and the cable management is a bit finicky (but way better than not having any cable management at all).After getting the arm assembled, it was pretty easy to set up with the software and get the included controller set up (which is one of the better ways to control any multi-axis robot). Overall, this is a pretty good product and can recommend if you want to get started on robotics / want to play around with a robot arm. They’re still regular servo motors so the payload can’t be too high but reasonable given the size (and price) of it.

Not a 6 axis arm
Contrary to what the manufacturer claims, this is a 5 axis arm. The fact that it has 6 servos does not make it a 6 axis robot. The 6th servo motor on this arm controls the gripper, commonly known as the end effector in the robotics world. A true 6 axis robot has an additional axis of rotation between axis 3 and 4. This is similar to the forearm of a human arm being able to rotate so the palm of your hand is able to face up or down. Search for 6 axis robot videos and you’ll see what I mean.A minor point, but the naming of the axes on a multi axis device always begins at the base of the robot. Axis 1 is the base of the robot and the joint at the end of the arm is axis 5. This is true regardless of whether you’re talking about a 3, 4, 5, 6 or 7 axis device. How do I know this? I wrote software for SCARA and 6 axis industrial robots for 18 years before I retired.That said, this is a decent toy. You can learn the basics of robotics using it. The manufacturer claims their control software runs on iOS and macOS. Be aware that you must have a M1 or greater Mac to load the software. It will not install on an Intel Mac. This is not mentioned anywhere in Hiwonder documentation. You will only find out once you go the the app store and try to install the app.Overall documentation is poor for this device. The servo motors have an input side and an output side. Their description of setting up the arm call both ends servos, when the input side is actually an encoder. An encoder supplies feedback to the controller telling the position of the motor.Don’t expect smooth movements of the arm. Depending on how much the arm is extended (their joints 2 and 3). The further you try to reach for and object, the more jerky movements become. The motors are too heavy and contribute to instability. It would be better to use a pneumatic actuator for the gripper instead of a heavy motor.I bought this for my grandson who is 5 years old. After putting it together and operating it I came to the conclusion that it wasn’t suitable for a child that age. He would surely damage it in no time. Be aware of this before you purchase it.Regards,Redwingz

Jag använde min sommarsemester till denna robot, köpte arduino + sensorer enligt “UNO secondary development kit”,och fick då lärda mig programmera. Imponerad av kvaliteten och hur skoj det var.

This was the first robotic arm I bought and I’m pleasantly surprised how well it works. I chose the assembled version, then the setup was very quick and self-explanatory. With the assembled version the only thing you need to attach yourself are the 4 rubber feet which only takes a minute.Despite having no prior experience, I didn’t even have to read the instructions, just downloaded the mobile app from the leaflet that comes with the device and it worked right away. Select the arm in the mobile app, press the bluetooth icon in top right to connect to it. You only need to connect the power cord to the arm and flip the black power switch to On, then the arm should light up. The mobile app layout is intuitive and easy to use. In the app you can click to create a new ‘action’, disable the motor, move the arm and save the action, thus stringing long sets of moves together. Can also set the time per move in milliseconds and loop the moveset infinitely. I like there’s PC software too, can connect it via USB cable to PC.I’m impressed how strong and accurate it is for such a small device. It remained cool after repeating the same task thousands of times in a row. No issues with overheating. Very cool, all around great design of hardware and software, I feel like this opened up a whole new world of creativity for me.If you need to automate any repetitive manual tasks, this is an amazing tool to have. This model is especially good for gripping and lifting small objects, pulling levers, or pressing buttons.