Table of content:
- Full Scale Portal Turret
- How It Works: Full Scale Portal Turret
- The Making Of: Full Scale Portal Turret (Part 1)
- The Making Of: Full Scale Portal Turret (Part 2)
Overview
This is a scale 1:1 turret from the game Portal with all things a turret should be able to do. It can talk, it can see. It can open and close, and aim around. It has a laser which can be aimed, and a light up eye. Best of all, it has 4 fully functional nerf guns that together can shoot up to 400 rounds per minute.
Why did I build this? Because I can.
The turret was originally made for SHA2017 as a show piece. The basics were built in around 50 days. By then, it was capable of doing everything it can do now, just worse. It was later revisited for CCC camp 2019 and finished properly. To follow that route from idea to turret, visit the making of part 1 and part 2.
Specs
- Over 300 hours of 3D printing: The turret is an absolutely massive print, containing hundreds of parts. All the smooth white parts are 3D printed. All of the mechanisms that move are 3D printed. The nerf guns are mostly 3D printed.
- Movement: The turret can open and close automatically. It can move around 20 degrees in all directions, both with the guns and the laser. All movements use either hobby servo’s or DC motors with potmeters for feedback.
- 4 Nerf guns: The turret contains 4 fully functional nerf guns that use flywheels to launch the darts. The flywheels are made of quadcopter outrunner motors, and spin at 25000 rpm. The theoretical speed of each dart is over 100km/h, though in reality it is probably a bit lower. Each gun holds around 18 darts and can shoot 2 darts per seconds.
- Controls: The turret is controlled using an Arduino Mega for the movement, and a Raspberry pi 3+ for the talking and watching. Ultimately the pi makes the decisions, though the Arduino is the one that does all of the moving and shooting. A camera in the head can see wherever the turret can shoot, and speakers in the base allow the turret to speak.
The source files
The source files, given without any guarantee that they will be helpful. The turret takes ages to build (I have over 6 months clocked in this so far) and requires skills in mechanics, 3D printing, electronics and programming (both embedded and software) to get working. I also cannot guarantee that with all the files you will get a complete turret. Only do this if you were capable of doing this yourself anyway but can do it quicker with my files.
You have been warned!
If you downloaded the files from this site and liked it, please consider going to the Donations page. This will help the development of more free designs and plans.
License
The project described on this page is licensed under the Creative commons – Attribution – ShareAlike license.
consists of the book itself
Wow, this Full Scale Portal Turret is amazing! The level of detail and realism is incredible. I can totally imagine it coming to life in a Portal game. Great job by Ytec 3D!
I’ve been having a good think about starting this project. But given that I have not much experience in Mechanics, Programming or Electronics, I was thinking of just having it as a non-motorised model, no electronics, functional guns, noises, movement etc. Just a stand still model with maybe an LED for the eye.
I’ve only used STL files using PrusaSlicer as opposed to STEP files on CAD software. Is there a series of STL files I can download for this project?
Please let me know if this sounds unrealistic. Thanks 🙂
This project is not really designed to be a shared, easy to follow project. It is done for me, and I am not doing anything else with the files, so I openly share for people to use, but the files are more a reference to people following along than a complete set for people to replicate.
If you have little experience with making simpler stuff in mechanics, even with the files making a full sized turret is going to be a massive challenge. I’d start with a smaller turret, maybe someone else’s files. This turret has 100’s of hours of 3D printing, and needs mechanical parts to fit those prints to. It is definitely an advanced project, even without the movements.
I’m still interested in this project, but I see the source files were taken down. Was this intentional? If so may they be purchased instead?
There was an issue with the files. Give me a day to fix them and upload them again.
Most source files were added again. There is now the existing code, Parasolid, STEP and 3D pdf of the whole assembly. Hope it helps.
Hey is it possible to buy one of these? They are amazing and I would love to own one.
is it possible to make a full model for assembly.
Can you specify what exactly it is you want here? All source files are shared in the downloads, so here you could open all files if you have Solidworks, and see how it is assembled.
$1000?