WiFi Dog Feeder Using Esp32 Cam

Dogs are my favorite things in the world. And my dog happens to be the number one dog in the world.
Because Bindis’s the number one dog in the world I like to give her lots of scratches and sometimes even treats, If I could I would give her scratches and treats 24/7, But theres a couple problems with that, number one being crippling obesity, and number 2 in order to never run out of treats I need to buy them with money, in order to get money I need to go to work. While I’m at work, I’m not at home and my number one dog isn’t getting scratched or getting a treat, and that’s a problem frankly I needed fix as soon as possible.

Please Watch Video Before Reading. It will be much more explanatory than the instructable.

Supplies

Parts used for this project:

Esp32 cam: https://amzn.to/3qOziLi

Servo motor: https://amzn.to/3bNwYjl

3D printer: https://amzn.to/3bNwYjl

Piezo buzzer: https://amzn.to/3bNwYjl

Arduino: https://amzn.to/3bNwYjl

A much easier way to get this to work would have been to use a simple raspberry pi kit

Screen: https://ban.ggood.vip/XsqQ

Raspberry Pi 3 Model B: https://ban.ggood.vip/XsqQ

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Step 1: Build Dispenser and Scratching Arm

To solve this dog scratching injustice I realized I was going to have to get creative. I set up a WebCam using an ESP 32 camera and I eventually got it working on my phone using the Blynk app.

To drop a treat I design to 3-D print a mechanism to drop one treat at a time. It’s driven by 9 g mini servo and actually works a lot better than I expected it to.

To scratch my dog I used a heavy duty servo and a carbon fiber pipe in order to get a scratching motion. This actually ended up scaring my dog and I later removed it.

There is also the problem that my dog did not like the robot at all. To solve this I put a piezo buzzer and wired that to the ESP 32. I then began to train my dog by giving her a treat anytime I sounded the buzzer. Now she associates the beep with getting a tree so when I buzz the beeper my dog comes running over.

Step 2: Hide Electronics in Enclosure

I was going to 3-D print a fancy looking enclosure for this project. But I realize I hadn’t uploaded a video in so long that I decided to rush it and use an old cardboard box. It actually ended up working better than I thought and I put a couple weights at the bottom to hold it down.

I 100% admit how janky the setup is and accept it.

Step 3: Things Go Wrong

Everything was working great and I can give my dog a treat while I wasn’t home and it was really cool. Unfortunately things came to an abrupt halt when I noticed that my cat was stealing treats on the WebCam.
Cats are the worst and I was not OK with this.
I couldn’t find a solution to scare my cat away so I decided to trash the entire robot.

Step 4: Reflecting

As fun as it was to give my dog a treat while I wasn’t home the problems that this robot brought we’re not worth the satisfaction.

I decided to trash the robot once and for all and settle on giving my dog a treat the old-fashioned way, in person.