How to start
- Get a piece of cardboard, scissors, screwdriver and some nuts and bolts (M3 will work best)
- Choose the robot and cut the cardboard according to the design
- Assemble the robot with nuts, bolts and rubber bands with a help of a screwdriver
- Attach motors and Micro:Bit to the construction
- Code the robot in MakeCode – you can find an example code in our manuals
Why cardboard?
Cardboard is good enough for robotics – REALLY! It is strong enough, it is easy to make models with, it has its limitations but in an educational environment it is not a bug – IT IS A FEATURE. Robotics is about solving problems and working around your hardware limitations.
Look around you – you will surely find great supplies of free cardboard to reuse so do not buy another plastic toy – get creative with what you have on hand
Below you can find some tips and tricks how to work with cardboard in school with your students. These are not strict rules but field tested good practices, if something else works better with you and your students – LET ME KNOW!
Cardboard advantages (from teacher point of view!)
- Endless Resources: With an endless supply of recycled cardboard, there’s never a shortage of materials. This abundance encourages a trial-and-error approach, allowing students to experiment without fear of wasting resources.
- Flexibility in Creation: You can go big or small. Whether it’s a towering skyscraper or a miniature house, cardboard construction knows no boundaries. This versatility supports all kinds of projects, catering to every student’s imagination and ambition.
- Personalized Learning: Every student’s building style is unique, and cardboard construction celebrates this diversity. It’s a fantastic medium for showcasing individual skills and creativity, enabling students to take pride in their personal accomplishments. Cardboard is fantastic for storyteller builders who want to add some personal touch and twist to everything they do.
- Time and Space Efficiency: THIS ONE IS A GAME CHANGER. If you ever worked in class with any robotic construction sets you know the burden of keeping all the parts in order or the frustration of loosing this one important block necessary to finish a specific lesson. With cardboard there are no blocks to manage and when you finish your work, there’s no tedious sorting or storage required. You simply remove few electronic parts and nuts and bolts and dispose used cardboard.
- Sustainability: This is a valuable side effect, instead of buying another plastic toy, you can reuse material that would land in the trash bin otherwise. Once the project concludes cardboard can be easily recycled, aligning with eco-friendly practices and teaching students about the importance of sustainability.
Cardboard limitations
- No advanced engineering – you will not build a gearbox with cardboard or any other complex mechanism
- Limited durability – if you want your robot project to last a lifetime you have to go for different material or construction blocks
- Learning curve – as with every craft, learning to operate with cardboard takes time, your students constructions will not look pretty in first try, it takes patience and precision to develop necessary skills but it is also very rewarding
Cardboard types
Best type of cardboard is a one layer 3mm cardboard you can find it in small and medium boxes usually food packaging, shoe boxes etc. It is easy to cut with scissors and bends nicely.
If you decide to buy cardboard you can get it very cheap in large sheets originally purposed for packaging. In Poland a 120x80cm sheet of 3mm cardboard costs about 0,5$ in 2024, and you can build about 20 robots with it.
Thicker cardboard as two layer 6mm you can see in the picture above is to tough for kids to cut with scissors and is hard to bend. It can be found in fruit and vegetable crates in grocery stores. It is hard to make models out of it but can be useful for elements that require stiffness, e.g. wheels.
Cutting cardboard
I suggest cutting cardboard with good quality scissors as it is a method safe for kids. You would surely get a cleaner edge with a proper utility knife but for safety reasons you`d better not give them away to your students, unless you know what you are doing.
Bending cardboard
Making cardboard connections with nuts and bolts
As a main method of making connections within cardboard elements we suggest using a screwdriver for making punctures and then twisting it with nut and bolt. At first glance this might seem like an overkill but this method provides strong and rigid connection, is very easy to make even for small kids with some practice, you can disassemble the connection and fix it easily. Also nuts and bolts are endlessly reusable.
PRO TIP – for some quick prototyping and testing you do not even have to screw the nut on the bolt. The bolt thread will keep the cardboard connected for a while.
Cutting holes
Puncture the cardboard in four corners of the rectangle hole you want to make, this will give you tracing points for scissors cuts on both sides of the cardboard sheet.
Preparing the servo motor
You can use stock servo motors to build with cardboard; the only trick is to modify the horn slightly by attaching screws that usually come in the servo package. This way, you can easily punch through and remove the cardboard from the horn. The modification process is a bit tedious, and I would not recommend passing it on to an unskilled student, but it only needs to be done once.
See the video below for visual instructions on how to do it.
IMPORTANT!
Tools you need
1. Screwdriver
Main assembly tool for cardboard robots used for nuts and bolts and making punctures in the cardboard.
We recommend using 10cm long screwdriver with PH0 phillips tip best for M3 nuts and bolts. It is also more comfortable to use a screwdriver if its handle has rotatry tip.
PROTIP!
Use screwdriver to puncture the cardboard and make holes for bolts. It requires some practice but with proper guiding this assembly technique is accessible and safe even for small children.
2. Scissors
Use good quality scissors for with fairly sharp tip to cut the cardboard and making bending traces.
3. Nuts and bolts
In our design process we found out that M3 nuts and bolts we were using in our previous LOFI Robot wooden construction system are a great way for cardboard constructions as well.
Main advantages of nuts and bolts:
- Provide sturdy and firm joint
- It is easy to make corrections and take a step back in your assembly process – reduces building stress
- Cheap when bought in quantity
- Reusable and almost indestructible – unless your students will eat them, you can reuse nuts and bolts millions of times
- Clean connection – does not make mess as glue and adhesive tape
4. Rubber bands
Standard rubber bands are a great thing for putting things together and greatly speed up prototyping with paper. Rubber bands are easy and fun to use even for small kids, encourage play and boost creativity. Furthermore parts assembled with rubber bands can be reasambeled as many time as you want which takes down fear of failure and encourage experimentation.
Advantages of rubber bands:
- Easy to source from recycled packaging
- Cheap to buy in bigger packages
- Reusable
- Clean work
- Fun and inspiring to use 🙂
Do not use glue or adhesive tape!
Usually wherever you find building instructions for paper models, you are guided to assemble them with paper glue, glue gun or any type of adhesive tape.
We encourage you not to use them because they are:
- Messy – your hand get dirty, paper gets dirty, everything get dirty with glue 🙁
- Glued connection is irreversible – you can not take a step back and review your idea – this rises design and assembly stress
- Needs refill – paper glue and adhesive tape is not so expensive still it is a cost to refill your supplies from time to time
- Glue takes time to dry and stiffen – lesson time is to precious to waste
Improve your classroom experience
Printable Robot Templates
Downloadable PDF file with vector-based printable designs of all our robots in A4 format.
Micro:Bit Robotics – Video course
Get a practical insight how to use BBC Micro:Bit in the classroom. Learn how to code cardboard robots with useful lesson ideas.
Cardboard Robots Inventor Kit
If you need a complete kit with all the tools and electronics to build Cardboard Robots consider buying our kit 🙂
Robot Stencils
Set of reusable robot stencils to help your students build cardboard robots faster and easier.