Yellow Socket/Ratchet Storage and Dispenser, Instructables Robot Style

The Project:

Welcome dear reader, to a practical yet fun Instructable project, a socket and ratchet storage unit where the sockets are stored on two electronically controlled carousels operated by a momentary push button, one carousel for the 12mm (1/2 inch) set, and the other for the 6.5mm (1/4 inch) set. The button is pushed to rotate the carousel and released when you reach your desired size. Each socket is organised in size order with easy to read labels and the carousels are wired to rotate starting from small sockets to large. When the carousels are in their resting position, a couple of door flaps hide everything. There is also a draw to store the ratchets, extension arms, and adapters. This is all housed in a wooden storage unit in the shape of the famous Instructables robot standing on a black base but built to give the impression that it is balancing on its own two wheels, but is actually supported by the wheels/legs and a sheet of clear acrylic sheet. I could have built a simple socket storage box, but I recently realised that I've been an Instructables member for nearly 15 years now (at time of writing) and wanted to celebrate that by doing something fun (and besides, the robot is a cool looking dude).

The Inspiration:

As I just mentioned, I have been an Instructables member for nearly 15 years (come January 20207) which I only realised when I saw it on my profile, although I have been following the website since its inception 20 years ago. So I wanted to something fun to celebrate this, but I also did need a socket and ratchet storage unit with easy to read size labels so I don't have to keep reaching for my reading glasses every time.

What's Involved:

Mostly woodwork using 9mm and 12mm MDF (you can use plywood as well), a little electrical work rewiring the turntable motors and adding some LED lighting, some cutting and hot gluing some foam core pieces, and a paint job that matches the robot yellow colour scheme as close as possible. And you don't have to use this design for sockets, with a few little changes you can use it as an automated spice rack, snack dispenser, medication dosette box, screwdrivers, jewelry... and a lot more. Lets get to it.

Here is the list of what I used.

Tools:

1. Pencil
2. Metal ruler
3. Metal angle ruler
4. Tape measure
5. Jigsaw
6. Handheld circular saw
7. Hobby knife
8. Drill/driver with drill and screwdriver bits
9. Nail gun
10. Hot glue gun
11. Wood clamps
12. Wire cutters/strippers

Materials:

1. 1 x sheet of MDF 12mm x 610mm x 1220mm
2. 1 x sheet of MDF 9mm x 610mm x 1220mm
3. Wood glue
4. 1 x lazy Susan bearing, 50mm
5. 1 x sheet of A2 black 5mm foam core
6. Small scrap of white foam core for the hands
7. 2 x 16cm diameter USB powered turntables
8. 1 x sheet 3mm clear acrylic A3 size
9. 2 x momentary push button switches
10. 2 (one pair) x 25cm soft-close draw runners
11. Electrical wire
12. 2 x wooden kitchen rolling pins
13. 2 x white 3v to 12v 5mm LEDs
14. Insulating shrink tubes
15. 2 x red detergent bottle caps and 2 x black drinking straws for the ears
16. 'Gran Via' matt finish yellow paint, (pretty close match to the robot logo colour)
17. Black silk paint for the base
18. Paint brush and masking tape

I could have made a simple box with draws to store my sockets and ratchets, and I could have taken ideas from my past robot builds and included a microcontroller, microphone, keypad etc. where I could type in or use speech rec to select a socket size and have the carousels stop at the correct socket size, but this is a build where I wanted to keep the operation simple but interesting.

The overall size of the robot was dictated by the length of the longest tool, my longest 12mm ratchet that is 26cm long that lays flat in the draw. Then I took rough measurements of the robot mascot by zooming in on the logo, measuring (10cm square for the body) and scaling everything (head, arms, legs etc.) up by x3.

For the stand and to give the illusion of the robot balancing on only its wheels, there were a few ways I could have achieved this, a black painted board to match the base of the stand, black painted supports fixed towards the rear under the body, or a third leg. But I decided to use a sheet of 3mm clear acrylic/Plexiglass as it would give the same effect but being able to see through it would help sell the illusion even more, especially in low light.

The use of foam core to make the carousel trays meant that I could easily make the curves needed instead of doing it out of wood, and it also meant that these were easily replaceable should I ever need to make layout changes in the future. The trays are not full circles so the flat parts line up with the front of the body so a couple of flaps hide everything and the robot has its full look, but when they are rotated, they protrude enough out of the body to gain to the sockets.

The heaviest tools are the ratchets and extension bars, so they sit in a soft-close slide out draw, keeping the weight at the bottom of the body making the overall structure more secure, and sit in a foam core tray with dividers.

As it's the Instructables robot, I used the colour scheme of yellow with hints of red, black, white and a little silvery grey. For the yellow, I worked out as best on my as I could using my laptop that a good yellow match for the robot mascot is similar to hex colour code ffc21a, which the profile translates to RGB Value: 255 red, 194 green, and 26 blue, CMYK Value: 0% cyan, 24% magenta, 90% yellow, and 0% black (these codes will be helpful for the face later on). I found a paint in my local hardware store that was a very close real world match which was a vivid warm yellow with a hint of gold.

And finally, using a little artistic license, instead of going by the bell shaped robot mascot body, I opted to go for right angles to utilise the space from a cube shape.

On to the build.

Using the measurements supplied in the 'Design' images, measure, mark and cut out all of the panels needed using the 12mm and 9mm MDF (or plywood). Then using an 80 to 120 grit sandpaper and sanding block, sand down all of the edges of every piece.

To start making the body, we only need to put together the base, sides and back as the top will be added near the end of the build and the front needs to remain open. Working up side down, apply wood glue to the bottom edge of one of the side panels, place the opposite edge on your work surface and place the base panel on top, using the other side panel as a support. Nail through the base into the edge of the side panel (5 nails will be enough) then hammer in any protruding nail heads.

Continue attaching the back, and other side panels to the base and to each other the same way and put to one side for now.

The head is put together the same way as the body, applying glue and nailing down, attaching the sides and back panel to the base. The top and front panels will be attached towards the end of the build.

An optional addition is to have the head rotate using a lazy Susan bearing. With the head up side down, place the bearing onto the base, measure it so it is centered, mark the four drill hole areas then drill the holes small enough for the screws to bite in to. Screw down the bearing, rotate it so one corner of the top part of the bearing sits between the two holes of the bottom part of the bearing and drill a fifth hole. Align the bearing again and drill a larger hole just bigger than the head of the screws you are going to use, then place the head on top of the top body panel.

Once you have aligned the head so it is center of the body panel, rotate the head/bearing so it is at an angle again, the drill and screw in the other screws into the body panel through the large hole we just made, rotating the head after every screw. Put this assembly to one side for now.

The draw is made the same way as the body and head, gluing and nailing in one side panel to the base, then the back and then the other side panel. The front panel (draw front) can also be fitted now.

I fitted it later on only because I hadn't decided on whether to use a draw knob to open the draw or to make a taller draw front and open the draw by pulling it open using a under-hang, which I ended up doing. Because the bottom of the robot body would be suspended in the air, the bottom edge of the draw front sits 3cm lower than the base creating the under-hang to open the draw with, and meant I wouldn't ruin the look of the front of the robot with a draw knob.

Next, lay the draw runners onto the bottom of the draw, the mark the mounting hole positions, drill, and the screw the runners to the draw. The draw will be fiitted after painting.

The two carousels are made in two separate wood modules, a base, a top two sides and a front. Using the measurement diagrams, mark out a circle to the front of the top panel, drill a large hole just inside of the circle marking, and cut it out with a jigsaw, sanding down the cut edges until smooth.

Now with the bottom panel, glue and nail down the two side panels to the top of the base panel, then the front panel, then the top panel with the circle cutout. The last photo shows the front flaps that will hide the carousels, which will be fitted at final assembly.

Using the four 3cm deep MDF strips, glue and nail these to the inside of the body, making sure they are level front to back, and the same height on the opposite sides. These supports are what the carousel modules will sit on.

The carousel trays are made from black 5mm foam core, black because it keeps in with the overall colour scheme, and it's also easy to spot if a silver/chrome socket is missing. Use the measurements supplied in the 'Design' images for the following. What I did first was to lay out the sockets onto a piece of paper to make a template to get an idea of diameter and socket locations to see how many I could fit.

Mark out the circles with a drawing compass and cut out with an Xacto knife with a new blade fitted either using a correct size plate, our freehand, Just make the first cut a score cut, light pressure just to break the surface, and repeat (don't try to cut the pieces out in one try). Then make a straight cut to remove a section of the disks.

Next cut out some strips to make the outer and inner rings and separators. For the two outer rings, we need to make some kerf cuts (a series of partial, parallel cuts are made into a piece of material). For foam core, all you need to do is to break the surface of the top card layer and lightly score the foam, so use a new blade and use light pressure making the cuts roughly 1 -2mm apart.

Apply hot glue either to the outer edges of the disks or along the bottom of the kerffed strips and attach to the disks. Place the sockets into their positions, cut small foam core pieces to make the dividers, glue into place, and finish off by attaching the inner kerffed ring. Put the trays to one side for now.

Here you can use standard drill bits to drill the holes onto the clear acrylic sheet, but I advise using 'Stepper' drill bits, as these make cleaner holes and vastly reduce the risk of chipping or cracking the acrylic/Plexiglass/Perspex.

Using the stand base and backing strip, apply glue to the strip, attach to the base and nail down. At this point, apply some black paint to the back of the stand base as we will cover this with the acrylic sheet.

When the paint is dry, remove the protective backing paper from the acrylic, place against the back of the base, drill the mounting holes (the size of the threads of the screws you're going to use) and screw into place. Place the acrylic onto some scrap wood and drill some more mounting holes for where it will attach to the back of the body. Place to one side for now as we will be attaching the body to it in the following step.

The Legs: To make the legs, I used a cheap 5cm diameter wooden rolling pin. Use a saw to cut two equal lengths and sand down the cut edges.

The Wheels: To make the wheels, use a 70mm hole saw drill bit and cut out four circles using the 12mm MDF. Glue to of them together and clamp down until the glue dries. Using some more MDF, cut out two 5cm squares and four 3.5cm x 2cm pieces. Remove the clamps from the wheels, and glue the pieces into place as per the 11th and 12th photos and clamp together. Then the glue is dry, drive in a few nails, apply glue to the square pieces, fit onto the legs and drive in a couple of screws.

Finish off by drilling two holes for each leg, through the base of the body, line up the legs over the holes, drill through the holes enough to mark the legs, remove and drill pilot holes into the legs where they are marked. Start screwing in some screws through the base of the body just enough that the tips of the screws poke through the other side, spread some glue over the tops of the legs, then hold them into position lining up the drilled holes to the screw tips, and screw the legs to be body.

Lay the body onto its side, line up the base so the acrylic is flat onto the back of the body and the wooden base is touching the bottom of the wheels. Apply a little glue to the bottom of each wheel, screw the acrylic to the back of the body and a couple more screws through the bottom of the base and into each wheel.

The Arms: For the arm, use the second rolling pin. Here we will make a diagonal cut to make two arms out of the rolling pin. Mark out the total arm lengths (10.5cm), and make a careful diagonal cut. Cut off the ends then sand off the cut edges to make them smooth. You can screw them to the body now by lining up the arms to the body, drilling through the body into the arms, and screw together, or you can attach them after painting like I did.

For the painting, two colours are used, the yellow, and black for the base. Use masking tape to cover the acrylic (from the top of the rear stand panel up to the base of the body) and give the body three to four coats of the yellow paint to the inside and outside of the body and legs only (I did a full brush paint as I didn't feel it necessary to break out a roller). After the last yellow coat, paint the stand and wheels black, only painting what would be the tyres. When the paint was dry and the masking removed, the sides of the wheels were coloured in using a silver/grey marker pen.

TIP: You only need to paint the inside of the body where it will bee seen, so the tops of the carousel module supports, top edges of the body where the top panel will attach can be left bare.

The turntables I used came apart by simply pulling off the actual turntable from the base as they were only a press fit. The following is assuming that the same or similar turntables will be used.

Measure the diameter of the base of the momentary push button switches, then use the same size drill bit to drill holes in the front corner of the carousel modules. Feed a length of two cord wire through the hole, strip the ends and connect these the the switch which you can then press fit into the holes.

The circuit board and switches from the turntables were not needed so the wires were cut and PC board removed only leaving two wires connected to the DC motor. Connect one motor wire to one of the push button wires, then using another length of two cord cable to make the power connection, connect one wire to the other motor wire, and the other to the push button wire. You can either solder and insulate the wire joins using shrink tube, or use wire connectors... it's dealers choice. You can connect the end of the power connection cable to a USB power cable (just two wires inside) to test that everything works (check the attached wiring diagram above).

To finish this step, apply hot glue to the bottom of the turntables and place them into the holes of the carousel modules making sure they are centered before the glue cools. Leave the ends of the turntable power cables stripped but unwired to anything for now.

Instead of painting and hand drawing the robot face onto the MDF face panel, I drew it using a paint program on my laptop using the mascot image as a template and used the yellow colour codes mentioned in Step 1 to fill out the rest of the face and printed it off. Measure out where the eyes are located on the print, drill out the holes (one big and one smaller for the two different sized eyes), make a small foam core bracket and poke two white 5v LEDs through, then glue the bracket to the inside of the head. Stick the face printout to the face panel using some double sided tape and cut off any excess paper with the Xacto knife. We wire these up in the next step.

We can put now do the final assembly to bring this build to an end. This was the point where I screwed in the arms mentioned in Step 8 and the draw front in Step 4.

Draw: Next, place the draw into the body with the draw runners partially pulled out, line the draw up making sure the front of the runners are flush with the front of the body, then fit a screw into the holes at the back end of the draw. Double check the alignment again then slowly pull the draw out fitting more screws along the way.

Ears: For the ears I used two black drinking straws and an couple of red detergent bottle caps. Drill a hole the same diameter as the straws into the top center of the bottle caps and then through each side of the head. Feed the straws into the head and add a drop of hot glue, then add a little hot glue to the edge of the bottle caps, feed through the straws and attach to the head.

Head: Apply wood glue to the sides of the face panel and attach to the head, place the head onto the robot body, drill a hole through the base of the head and top body panel going through the Lazy Susan, feed the LED cable through and fix the top body panel to the sides using some nails.

Hands: Using a small piece of white foam core, mark out the hands with a black marker pen and cut out with an Xacto knife. Make a few kerf cuts, bend the hands to start forming the curved shape, apply hot glue to the edge (what would be the wrist) and attach to the arms.

Carousels: Insert the lower carousel module, apply hot glue to the turntable, and attach the carousel tray. Do the same for the upper module then wire the two carousels and the eye LEDs to a two wired power USB cable (see wiring diagram in Step 1) which is fed through the pre-drilled hole in the bottom of the body (A or C, your choice, I used the USB-A cables that came with the turntables). Test to make sure everything works.

Draw layout: Cut out a piece of black foam core to cover the draw base, then lay out your ratchets, extension bars etc. then cut and glue foam core dividers to separate the tools. The dividers only need to be shallow so you can easily remove the tools when needed.

Flaps: Drill and screw in two hinges per flap, marry up one flap to the body so it hangs just above the top of the draw front, mark the drill holes, drill and screw the flaps to the body.

Labels: Plug the USB cable into a power supply, then make the socket size labels and attach to the carousel trays. There are a number of ways to do this, hand write, print form a PC, or do what I did and use a pocket ink free label printer, cut out the sizes and attach to the trays.

Final jobs: The last couple of jobs are to attach the head to the body. Rest the head/top body panel on top of the body and nail down. And the final job is to do a little drawing. Draw out the details with a black marker pen for the front of the body, draw the lines around the arms and legs and around the edges of the body and head. I free handed this because I wanted the rough drawn look just like the mascot, but if you want a neater job, use masking tape to give you straighter lines. And we are done.

And there we have it. A socket storage unit, a little bit over engineered maybe, but that was the point, to have something that makes me smile every time I use or even walk past it, and a humble nod to Instructables that actually changed my life and got me making again after a serious accident a few years back.

As I mentioned in the intro, you don't necessarily have to store sockets and ratchets, as with a few small changes, you can store a number of things, even little snack bars, electrical components, stationary and more. A fun build that has real world practical uses.

Thanks for reading, and happy making.