This Indoor Putting Green Can Morph Itself on the Fly

As I understand it, golf is a pretty difficult game — I’ve never actually managed to hit the ball myself. I know about technology, not sports. Every golf course is different, and every hole on those courses is also unique. Driving the ball down range is only half the battle, and the smooth, highly-manicured grass of the green provides a unique challenge in itself. Because the friction is so low, the path the ball rolls through can vary wildly based on slope and elevation changes. To practice with all kinds of slopes, YouTuber High Voltages has built a putting green that can morph on the fly.

To make that possible, the entire synthetic putting green mat is laid over 24 electric scissor jacks. Each of the jacks in that 3x18 grid is similar to what you’d use to lift a car up several inches so you can change a tire. Those are more than enough to hold up the material for the putting green, as well as someone standing on it. The idea is that each jack can be raised or lowered independently in order to create a completely new putting green. That can be configured as needed to adjust the topology of the green. Theoretically, it could even be used to match the putting greens at famous golf courses.

High Voltages is controlling those jacks with a combination of an Arduino and a Raspberry Pi. Ultrasonic sensors are positioned under each jack to accurately determine their height. The system can then toggle relays attached to the jacks’ power wires in order to raise or lower them to the desired positions. This project is still very much under development, but it appears that the electronics are pretty well sorted out. The final step will just be to lay the material for the green over the jacks — though it may take some experimentation to end up with the ideal amount of flexibility to create graceful and stable curves.