Just be careful with Chinese Amps, they are more powerful than the metric version
- FRA
- Forum
- Robots
- Events
- Media
- What's New?
All times are GMT. The time now is 11:04.
Just be careful with Chinese Amps, they are more powerful than the metric version
Yeah, the single channel FeatherTwos can actually handle more juice than a TZ, as 85 China amps translates to about 40 metric amps over 3 minutes.
Thanks for all the information Guys-We are actually running 24 volt CIM wheelchair
motors, the power is via 2 lipo 4s which gives us 32 volts.
I dont really want to change that set up because we are really happy with the
performance so far.
The motor for the jaws I think is also a CIM but a slightly longer one than the
ones used for the drive-it's rated at 30 amp also.
The idea is that one member of the team will have a two button box coming
off the main radio controller for open and close of jaws, I'm thinking the buttons will
be on springs so a quick press on either closes the jaws ( in tests the jaws closed
in less than a second on 16 volts) Im not sure how much amps will be drawn when
the jaws meet thier stop point.-theres no provision to cut the power supply at present.
Also is there a preffered method to get 32 volts down to 24 as most ESC I have
seen have a top voltage of 24 volts.
Another Sunday, another batch of snow and ice!
For the first time in a few week, we both managed to make it to the days work.
Today was spent setting up the link, and mocking up the all the intended layouts for wiring locations and routes.
It took us longer than anticipated to do this, as we struggled to fit things into varying sockets and othersuch. However, we managed to complete it, and after we traced out the intended location of the batteries, ESC, and motors, to work out how much cable we needed for it all.
There's a few things we established from today - the motor that runs the weapon doesn't run on its own fuse, unlike the the traction motors, so this might be modified in later on. We also need to actually build the area where the ESC will sit, and we'll need to finalise a solution for controlling the weapon motor, and whether to stick with the homemade solution, or one off the wonderful internet. We're aware of another upcoming purchase, the hydraulic jack trolley for getting it around will be quite a bit of money. So we may see how the homemade solution performs in a few real world scenarios before we make a final push on that front.
Over the week, Colin is going to try to make a start on building up the area needed to mount the ESC firmly in place, and I'll be paying another visit to Maplin, if its still open, as we need a bit of extra cable and sockets.
Sounds like good progress!
I can't believe we live in an age where the future of Maplin is in doubt. Such terrible times
Realistically speaking. I am 100% part of their problem. I know full well everything they sell can be bought from Chinese resellers for about £0.25 to £5. I only ever walk into their shop if I need it in a time I can't guarantee delivery from ChinaOriginally Posted by Theo
I can't believe we live in an age where the future of Maplin is in doubt. Such terrible times
I just go in because I can't be bothered with online shopping half the time. 3 days delivery vs A trip to Maplin. Plus they sell Stylophones, bought 6 from them over the years
Another Sunday, this time with 1 hour less sleep than usual. But not to worry, we both still put in a good days work despite that.
Today was another focus on the electrics. However, let's go back in time slightly - over the course of the week. Colin has removed the original container for the much smaller ESC we first planned to use, and has built a much larger one in a different position to contain the rather large Cytron ESC. During the week, I had also sourced some cables which would come in use today...
Dragging back to the slightly less back in time of today, we had a few issues getting some plugs onto some cables.
Unfortunately for some reason, we didn't manage to get the soldering iron (two of them), to solder in any meaningful manner. After a while of faffing around and achieving not much, Colin ended up finding his blowtorch and using that. Over the top, but certainly got the job done in record time. Next week, I'll take the soldering iron I have at home and see if that does any better - as using a blowtorch. Colin had also acquired some junction boxes, this allows us to split the battery power between the main Cytron ESC and the two traction motors, to another as yet to be decided ESC and the weapon motor. We found a nice little spot to put the junction out of harms way, but still relatively easy to access without having to remove it from its new home for maintenance. We also found a spot for the main fuse, which is now lovingly zip tied in place. The circuit starts at the batteries, then immediately into the link, after it goes into the fuse, and then as evidenced on image 1, straight into the junction box between the ESCs and motors - each motor still has its own fuse.
We finished off today by drilling some holes into the new ESC container for all the cables to go through. Because the Cytron ESC doesn't use plugs, and you simply screw the bare wires into it, this was an easy task as we didn't need to account for cable plugs in the hole size. Colin has fashioned a lid for this new ESC container, as well as extra side armor to protect the fairly thin box of the container, which we'll hopefully have done by next week along with the rest of the wiring (image 2)
We are thinking of using a FeatherTwo ESC for the weapon motor. However we're unsure of the best way to reduce the LiPo batteries of 24V (the 'flat' voltage') to 33.6V (fully charged) (2 x 14.8v nominal) to the near 24V required by a FeatherTwo, and carrying an extra battery exclusive for that ESC is not the ideal situation for us. So we may need to scratch that and find a different ESC for the task.
the images
19hxzPiOLD.jpg2V881LRnUa.jpg
One of the highlights of my week is reading this.
Do you think it'll be ready by Manchester? You may be able to have it on static display if not, I'm sure the audience will love it (beats another boring wedge flipper in the looks department any day). I've not seen Niall mentioned recently, is he still working on it?
Happy to read, thanks.
I'm not sure when that is. However I think we're still a few Sundays away from having something that properly functions. Especially in the weapon side of things. I think we're at a point where the driving will work reliably as soon as it is wired up now. I'm also unsure of Colins availability for such events at the current point in time. I'd be available without issue though, that much I can say. I'm not sure RE static displays, if that's beneficial overall for all involved or not?
Niall is unfortunately no longer part of the project. It's back to Colin & Myself, who are certainly in it for the long haul!
Last edited by Redirect Left; 25th March 2018 at 21:55.
Reply With Quote
Bookmarks