Design Firm 3D-Prints a 14-Foot 'Robot'

Fox Sports commissioned the statue of Cleatus, the animated robot on its NFL broadcasts, for the lobby of its Los Angeles headquarters.

If there is one thing synonymous with Fox Sports, it's Cleatus, the animated robot that takes you in and out of commercial breaks.

Well, Fox Sports wanted a giant, real-life robot for the company's lobby. For this, they hired Thingergy, a design firm based out of Burbank, Calif., that "makes things” — which is only partially accurate. The company makes awesome things, typically for the entertainment industry, such as a real-life sculpture of Pogo from The Umbrella Academy.

Cleatus is a massive, 14-foot tall statue that was entirely 3D printed. In 10 weeks, a crew of roughly 20 people printed 142 parts in-house. The project amassed 2,681 hours of print time (about 112 days worth of time), but that doesn't include outsourced parts.

The 3D-printed robot is attached to an aluminum frame, which is attached to a 2,000-pound base for support.

Thingergy outsourced Cleatus's face mask to Scicon Technologies, a rapid prototyping service bureau in California that printed the mask on a 3D Systems SLA machine. And Pictographics, out of Las Vegas, printed 10 parts, including the calves, shins, pelvis and thighs on a Massivit 1800D.

Among Thingergy's equipment, which the company affectionately calls its "Robot Army," is the 3DP Workbench from 3D Platform. 3DP is no stranger to massive builds — the large-format printer has done previous work, like a life-size copy of an employee, and a massive version of my head (it's pre-beard, so you know that some time has passed).

Jonathan Schroeder, president of 3D Platform, says Thingergy’s Cleatus statue is “a truly impressive work of art.” According to Schroeder, 3D Platform’s high-flow extruders were a key part of making some of the large parts very quickly.

After Cleatus was primed and painted, it was installed in the Fox Sports lobby, where it now holds a 75-inch television.

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