Cats may be adorable, but they evolved to be predators. Unfortunately, responsible owners keep their cats indoors to avoid decimating the local wildlife population and that means Mr. Whiskers and Ms. Socks don’t get much opportunity to express their hunting urges. That’s why Sascha at Small Batch Factory designed Gatoino, which is an automatic laser turret toy that lets cats hunt for red dots indefinitely.
Gatoino automates laser cat toy playtime, putting less strain on owners’ wrists and keeping the fun going for as long as the furry felines want to keep up the chase. It moves the laser dot in two axes and does so in an unpredictable (pseudo-random) way, so it will keep the cats on their toe beans. And an onboard control interface lets the human adjust the playing field size and the movement speed, along with session schedules.
An Arduino Nano board controls all of that through a custom PCB to keep the wiring tidy. It moves the laser using two small SG90 hobby servo motors in an arrangement similar to a mirror galvanometer. Those parts all fit into a simple 3D-printed enclosure that can be placed on a shelf or mounted onto a wall out of the way.
If you’re interested in building your own Gatoino, the design files and instructions are available for purchase on the Small Batch Factory website.
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