Category: vibrator design

Silicone overmolded vibrator – balls revisited

March 10, 2016 in 3d printing, assembling, case design, molding, sextech, vibrator, vibrator design

Building your own silicone molded vibrator becomes now easier. We already have presented 3d printed forms for building your personal vibrator (massage wand, wireless charged vibrator). The vibrator uses the body interaction vibrator development board. The body interaction board has a Arduino compatible microcontroller, vibration strength control by motion, a vibration motor and a rechargeable battery.

What is new? The electronics including battery are in the base of the vibrator. We developed a 3d printed enclosure for the electronics. This has several benefits: The assembling of the electronics and the molding itself is easier as everything is fixed within the enclosure. And it is more safe as the enclosure shields the electronics from the environment (and vice versa). In addition we used a different charging module from Seeed Studio. The input voltage is only 5V. Now you can connect the charging module with a USB connector and don’t need another power supply. (Look here for an explanation of wireless charging sender and receiver.)

Another improvement is the placing of the vibration motor. The vibration motor can now be placed in the center of the vibrator and it different heights. Just were you need the power.

Finally the mounting is improved. The mounting holds the enclosure when it is inserted into the form.

The mounting (together with the enclosure with the electronics) is inserted into the form. The form consists of two parts which must be fastened together by tinker wire. It is a variation of the ball theme.

We present a step by step procedure for tinkering the vibrator. You need:

3d printed form (molding form, 2 parts)
3d printed enclosure
3d printed mounting
body interaction vibrator development board
silicone with a high shore A value (eg. shore A 45 which is quiet hard but still flexible), approx. 100 ml
wireless charging module eg. from Seeed studio
soldering station, (hot) glue

Step by step procedure:

A. Print out all forms. You can download the forms from Thingiverse.

B. Connect the wireless charging module to the body interaction vibrator development board.

B.1 You have to solder a wire connecting (-) on the wireless charging module and GND on the body interaction board.

B.2 Now comes the tricky part. You have to connect (+) from the charging module with the body interaction board. Solder a wire at (+) of the charging module. But where do you solder the wire on the body interaction board? Unfortunately the wireless charging option was not taken into consideration during the development of the board. So there is no appropriate connection on the board.

The best solution is to unsolder the USB connector and connect to + of the USB connection. The easiest way to unsolder the surface mounted USB connector is done with a hot air soldering station. Alternatively you can solder the wire directly to the MAX1555 module – this solution is presented here. In any case: Be careful not to break the tiny pads connecting pcb and USB connector.

B.3 Connect the sender module with a 5V power supply. You can use a USB cable, dismantle the cable and connect the black and red wires.

C. Place the receiver charging coil on top of the enclosure. The diameter of the top side is a bit larger than the diameter of the bottom side. Use some glue to fix the coil. Don’t fix the mounting now. It is easier to do it later (step E).

D. Put the electronics into the enclosure: Begin with the body interaction board. The RFM12b is quite large so place it at an outer position. Then insert carefully the LiPo battery. Don’t force it! The plugs for the battery and the motor could break. If you have done so insert the tiny wireless charging receiver board. At the end fix the wires of the vibration motor in the middle of the enclosure.

E. Connect the mounting with the enclosure. There are 2 holes provided where the mounting fits into the enclosure. Use some glue to stick together both parts. (see picture above step C).

F. Put together both parts of the molding form. Use tinkering wire to attach both parts tight together. Then insert the enclosure into the form. Check the wireless charging function. The yellow LED must be on when you place the charging coil over the receiver coil.

G. Now poor silicone into the molding. We use Shore A 45 silicone which is rather hard. The silicone has to dry for some hours or days. Read the instructions of your silicone provider.

H. When the silicone is hard, you can remove the tinkering wire. Then carefully remove the form.

I. Remove the overhang.

J. Test the wireless charging. The orange LED must be on when both coils are near together.

K. Remove the mounting.

Design your own forms using Tinkercad. Start now and share!

Old versions of the enclosure:Enclosure & mounting togther, Enclosure , Mounting

Download the STL files for 3d printing from Thingiverse.

Update 2016/03/12: Added image of circuits showing where to solder the wireless charging module.

Update 2016/04/05 redesign of mounting and enclosure due to different versions of the wireless charging receiver coil

New molded silicone Vibrator – wireless interaction & charging

March 4, 2016 in 3d printing, Arduino, case design, molding, vibrator design

Preview of the new silicone vibrator designed by bodyinteraction –
wireless charging and wireless communication – Arduino based – programmable

Review of vibrator development boards

December 3, 2015 in Arduino, programming, review, vibrator, vibrator design

Designing your own sex toys with advanced technology is becoming popular. Although the community is still very small the interest is rising. In this article we will introduce for open source vibrator development boards including our body interaction 1. We will see how the design of the development boards determines the design space – the possibilities of sex toys which can be realized.

Comingle may be the most successful open source sex toy company. They invented the Mod – an Arduino based vibrator with 3 vibration motors. They also offer the Dilduino – a development board based on the Atmel ATmega342U4 (similar to the Arduino Micro). The board can drive 3 vibration motors. They have developed a great library for programming vibration pattern (“OS sex“). You can use arbitrary function like sinus or cosinus to define pattern. You can upload programs via the USB connection, but there is no wireless radio or WiFi connection on board. The board lacks battery charging support, so you need external power. As the board is quite large it is only suitable for larger toys. Available at Tindie.
Pro: supports 3 motors, full Arduino compatible, great library, superb tutorials
Cons: no wireless connectivity, no battery charger, quite large for being part of a sex toy

Pen 15 shield is a shield for the Arduino Uno. So you need an Arduino Uno in addition to the shield. The shield must be connected to the Arduino board. It has one driver for a vibration motor. This pioneer work was announced in 2011, but it is probably not available any more. The price is quite low. There is no battery charging option and it is very large compared to the other boards.
Pro: full Arduino compatible
Cons: no wireless connectivity, no battery charger, too large to be part of a sex toy

Master Beta Kit from Orgasmatronic Inc. is another shield for the Arduino Uno. It can control two vibration motors. The power source for the vibration motors could be different though you may control motors with different input voltages. Easy assembling and support with online tutorials.

Pro: full Arduino compatible, different motor input voltage
Cons: no wireless connectivity, no battery charger, too large to be part of a sex toy

The body interaction development board can drive one motor. It has a LiPo battery charging option. It can be controlled by motion – a 3-axis accelerometer is build in. Using motion you can control the vibrator – no need for further peripherals like switches or slider for controlling the vibration speed. The main advantage is the wireless radio especially if you like to use more than one sex toy at once. You can transmit data between your toys, control your toys or even synchronize them. The form factor is very small, though it can be part of a small toy. As the board is only 20x36mm there is not much space for further functionalities: It has no serial interface. To upload a program you need an ISP programmer (eg USBtinyISP). And it uses a microcontroller from the ATMEL ATtiny series. Although the tiny microcontrollers are getting more and more popular they have some disadvantage compared to the standard ATmega328p: There is not much memory on the chip (8K instead 32K), some libraries may not work, less I/O ports. Available at Tindie.
Pro: small form factor, LiPo battery charger included, wireless radio, motion tracking
Cons: some libraries don’t work, programmer needed for uploading programs

From Gideon, Paris, City of Love, https://flic.kr/p/pjoAL License: CC BY 2.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/

Most probably we will see more boards arrive and we hope that there are Open Source, too. But for a breakthrough for open source DIY sex toys an open standard would be helpful like the Arduino helped physical computing becoming popular for nerds, SIGs, artists, scientists, hobbyist, industry!
But open source sex toys are not only a technical endeavour. It is about our relation to love, sex, partnership, about taking responsibility. Open sex toys are about getting a deep and well-founded understanding of our personal sexuality and the sexuality of our loved ones.

Wireless battery charging of the body interaction vibrator development board

November 5, 2015 in 3d printing, molding, sextech, vibrator design

One major Problem oft DIY electronic sex toys (or massage wands) are the need to charge the batteries. Usually the batteries are charged via the USB connector. This means that there is a physical connection between the sex toy and the USB connector, making it impossible to mold the whole sex toy with eg. silicone.

The solution is to use a wireless charging module (eg. this module from Seeedstudio). It comes in two parts: The sender (IN) and the receiver (OUT). Both are connected with a coil. If you place the two coils close together, the sender coils induces power in the receiver coil. Though you can share the batteries wireless. The receiver could be molded, separating the electronics, batteries, connectors etc. from the environment. The result is a form with a smooth surface enabling secure usage as a sex toy.

We have made an easy DIY solution based on the body interaction vibrator development board, wireless charging module and a 3d printed silicone molding form.

Part A: The molding form consists of two parts.

3d print form A

Step 1: The form comes in 2 parts. Print both parts of the form. The STL file is called part A. After printing polish the inner part of the form as well as the surface between the two sides.

Step 2: Now print out part B. It is used to fasten the board, battery, receiver coil and receiver board.

Step 3: Connect the + pad of the wireless charging receiver board with the pin marked + of the vibrator development board (that’s pin 1 of the MAX1555 battery charging IC). Connect – of the receiver with the GND pad of the vibrator development board. You need two short wires and have to solder them at the two boards.

Step 4: Now wind up the wires connecting the board with the battery and the vibration motor. (The connection to the receiver board is not shown on the image.)

Step 5: Now attach the coil on the shorter “cross” of part B with some glue. There must be space between the coil and the outer longer cross. Then attach the board, battery and vibration motor as shown in the pictures. you can use some glue to fix these parts. Be sure to set the switch to the ON position.

The receiver board can be placed within the coil. It’s the small long board in the middle.

Step 6: Fix part B (with board, coil etc.) at part A. Be sure that there is enough space between them (min. 5mm).

Step 7: Now attach the second part of part A. Use some tinkering wire. Double check: There must be space between Part A and part B. And there must be space between the coil and the upper edge of form A as the coil must be molded by the silicone.

Step 8: Now pour silicone into the form. Use silicone with a high Shore A value. The higher the Shore A value is the higher is the firmness of the silicone form. We have used silicone with Shore A 45. You need about 90 ml silicone.

Step 9: After the silicone gets hard, remove the tinkering wires and softly remove the form A. Remove overhanging part.

Step 10: Now you can remove the outer cross of part B.

That’s it. It takes about half an hour (without printing). Before using check carefully that the silicone is solid. Even if you skew the silicone form you should not be able to feel the edges of the vibrator development board. Otherwise there is the danger to get hurt. Use it as a massage toy on your own risk. For charging the batteries place the molded coil over the sender coil. The yellow charging LED should go on.

The next development step is a battery charging station!

Download 3d printing files from Thingiverse

Modify and construct your own with the online 3d modelling software Tinkercad: Form A, Form B

Dildo form for overmolding vibration board

October 15, 2015 in 3d printing, molding, vibrator design

Instead of printing a vibrator case we construct a form for overmolding the body interaction vibrator development board. The updated overmolding process is described here

Download from Thingiverse: http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:1073109

Edit with Tinkercad: https://tinkercad.com/things/aqqmSmn78ex

Print your vibrator case, visit our galleries and read the quick start guide

September 24, 2015 in 3d printing, case design, vibrator, vibrator design

The case for the body interaction vibrator development board are printed with a 3d printer. There are two possibilities.

(1) You can use a printing service like Shapeway or Sculpteo. Sculpteo has the advantage that they offer food safe material. This means there are no risk if you apply the case to your skin or even insert the case. Follow this Link to the Public Sculpteo Library. The library offers 3d views, material, color, finishing configuration and price calculation (there are no surcharges for the designer.):
http://www.sculpteo.com/de/embed/gallery/?click=order&designer=south

(2) You can print the design on your own 3d printer at home. If you don’t have one you could go to your next Fablab or Hackerspace and ask if you could us the printer. You need a STL file which can be downloaded from http://www.thingiverse.com/south/designs

After printing the case you can assemble the body interaction vibrator development board. In the blog you will find several videos which explain the assembling. For a quick reference please download our guide: quickstartguide-bodyinteraction1

How-to assemble the vibrator ring case

September 17, 2015 in 3d printing, application, assembling, case design, ring, sextech, vibrator design

We have ordered a food safe version of the vibrator ring case from a 3d printing service provider. The case consist of the main body and a kind of cap to close the case.

The design could be improved to have more space for the battery and a more stable cap. The ring diameter is too small for most males, but you can combine the vibrator ring and the “organic” vibrator for her. The combination of these two vibrators gives you a vibration in two dimensions. (The vibration of a vibration motor is only strong in one direction – you can think of either the x-, y- or z-axis of a coordination system. If you combine two motors you have vibration along two axes of the coordination system, take three you have vibration along all axes).

The video shows how-to assemble your own vibrator ring.

View with YouTube

Improved version! Open with Tinkercad. Download from Thingiverse.

Assembling the new violet vibrator form

September 4, 2015 in Arduino, assembling, case design, vibrator design

We ordered the organic vibrator form from Sculpteo. They offer material which can be used for food – so it’s very safe.

IMG_20150901_212010[2] All you need for assembly is the body interaction motion controlled vibrator development board and two M3 screws (about 6mm long).

The video explains how-to assemble the Arduino compatible body interaction vibrator board and the form. Watch in Youtube

New vibrator design for the vibrator development board & 3d cases

July 16, 2015 in 3d printing, case design, interaction, sextech, vibrator design

Chain of Ball Vibrator design with cap

The new design catches the “chain of balls” design theme used in some sex toys. It was constructed in Tinkercad and it is really simple to do it on your own. This how-to video explains the construction in detail.

many balls body interaction vibrator development board

The design is composed from several spheres

Try it on your own in Tinkercad. Just grab a sphere, make a copy, resize the copy, make a copy again and repeat this until you have a chain of spheres. Now select all sphere and use the “align” tool. That’s it.

The tricky part is the screw cap. This is needed to enclose the body interaction vibrator development board.

Chain of Ball vibrator being printed in ABS, XYZ printer 1.0, on the bottom is the support material

Improved vibrator ring

June 4, 2015 in 3d printing, application, case design, ring, vibrator design

There is new version of the vibrator ring. The height is smaller than in the original version. As there must be enough space for the vibrator development board, the LiPo battery and the vibration motor the case is larger in height. Board and LiPo are now beside one another. The new case is printed with the daVinci 1.0 3d printer with yellow ABS.