RogueTwo Robots

[Ellis]

Rrrrrrg, so coooool! Can't wait to see how this develops, will be really nice to see a machine so different from the norm!

For the claw, instead of moving the pivot point down, which will reduce the gripping power, why not make it so it doesn't close as far, so you can open it further? I realise it may look cooler, but it might have to grip a bit of a robot that thin 2% of the time. How often is the body of a robot thinner than say, 70mm? I reckon you could gain 5cm of open-position, without losing any power, by doing this. In the rare situation of being drawn against a pancake of a robot, you could bolt on a claw extension and voil¡.

Anyway, look forward to it, not that I have to tell you but do keep us posted. :P

[Eventorizon]

[RogueTwoRobots]

I have no idea if the tracks will work well, or at all. They're the same ones as Ewan has for Flux. I just fancied trying them out to see. Should be easy enough to revert to wheels if the tracks are an epic fail, although it will lose several cool points.

I was considering that Ellis. Carcinus's claws never closed all the way either for the same reason as you mentioned. A reduction in crushing force in order to achieve more travel won't be too bad a thing though, as it just needs to have enough force to hold a robot between the two jaws. The actuator's only rated at 230kg max so it won't be a devastating crusher by any stretch.

Think I'll probably do what Kenny has done on Cobalt though, having a few different mounting points that can be altered for speed, force or travel.

I shall indeed post progress as it happens, quite excited about this build. Just a shame the one driver, one robot rule means I can't drive both this and Drumroll in competitive battles. Might rig the weapon controls up on a different TX so I can still be involved in its fights

[mattsdragons]

Were do you get these tracks?

[RogueTwoRobots]

Old-school Tonka bulldozer toys on eBay. Pretty hard to come by though, I found one but haven't seen any more in a while (though I've not been looking that much).

The first pic of Ewan's thread shows the tracks in their natural habitat: viewtopic.php?f=240&t=3596

[RogueTwoRobots]

Update

Happy New Year everyone! You're always best to start the year the way you intend it to continue, and for me that was in my shed building robots.

Unfortunately I never got any work done to the tracked grabber over Christmas, mostly because I pinched the actuator for Carcinus which, after choosing to retire it, I changed my mind and decided to rebuild. Partly for demos at Scot-Bots events and partly because I didn't want my dad driving the cool tracked one

The baseplate was shot to bits though, having been hacked up several times in various internal rejigs. So that's been remade from a piece of 8mm HDPE, as has the top panel which was previously 6mm MDF.
As mentioned, the previous homemade M12 actuator that was in there has been taken out and replaced with an 18V GLA-S actuator. Only 50mm stroke so the claws don't close that much, but should be enough to contain most robots:



As well as a sturdy mounting bracket at the rear, I've also made a Nylon block to fit round the front of it. This holds the whole actuator securely to the robot and makes the setup more solid than it's ever been. Those actuators are also fast!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2tc6L9qpN5M

The downside with a GLA-S actuator is that the limit switches have been removed as they don't work at higher voltages, but I'm going to have to make some up otherwise I predict much self-inflicted damage with this version. They've got a decent amount of force in them too; whether it will make much difference in the arena though I don't know!

[shakesc]

like the concept and something different

[psycho_fling]

glad to hear robotics is breaking the musical genre boundaries

nice work

[Eventorizon]

How much weight do you have? You could put a saw of some kind in the middle and go for something like Deadmetal! Removable so you can use it at scot bots of course.

[PJ-27]

Taylor Swift? Censor your listening before posting man!