RogueTwo Robots

I fancied setting up a build report on our machines a bit like what the Aussie guys have on their forum, plus I wanted to have something worthwhile to post for my 1000th post (woot!)

Team Terminal Damage

Team Terminal Damage basically consists of myself, my friend George Speirs from my schooldays, and my dad Michael who used to be purely taxi driver but Im now trying to get him into the actual robot combat more :)
Our first event was Rexs Robot Challenge 2004 and we now currently have three active robots.

Robots

Drumroll:- is the main robot, carrying a 3.2kg spinning drum on the front (I would add lethal to that description but needs a bit of work to reach that status :proud:). The chassis used to belong to Hornet 1, but I bought it when Gary upgraded and after running at two events without a drum attached I decided I needed to get round to weaponising it. It was at this point that I realised my dimensions were slightly off and the Hornet chassis was just a touch too small. So I built a new chassis from 20mm nylon, which has now been through two events and is standing up well.

Critical Damage:- used to run under the name of Terminal Damage, that competed in Rexs Robot Challenge 2004 (our first event), a school-hosted RRC style event and the UK Robotic Games 2005 before being retired. George later chose to bring it out of retirement and change its look slightly. Its a bit of an oldy bot as it still uses windscreen wiper motors and SLA batteries, and seems to keep getting new amour for each event (previous coverings include very brittle perspex, and an upturned garden wheelbarrow!)

Bullseye:- currently only used in whiteboards as an introduction robot for my dad. The chassis is used to run under the name Mini Rover (a feather replica of Typhoon Rover) but now has a wedge to replace the football guides. Desptie running fine on the bench, its been sluggish in the arena and is in need of a few fish suppers to add some weight.

Upgrades

Drumroll has had its internals rearranged yet again. Due to its small size it will always have very compact insides and they were arranged thus for the FW champs:

http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c367/ayrshirerobotics/Drumroll%20-%20Build/dr_build117.jpghttp://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...0-%20Build/dr_ build117.jpg
(it became a lot busier once it was fully wired up)

It was a bit too cramped at the champs when it came to maintenance and so Ive played around with different positionings to try and free everything up a bit.

The speed controllers have now been mounted to the sides of the internal bulkheads (two heatsink corners that protruded had to be cut and filed):
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c367/ayrshirerobotics/Drumroll%20-%20Build/dr_build139.jpghttp://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...0-%20Build/dr_ build139.jpg

with the power and motor wires going into terminal block units mounted to the base panel:
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c367/ayrshirerobotics/Drumroll%20-%20Build/dr_build142.jpghttp://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...0-%20Build/dr_ build142.jpg
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c367/ayrshirerobotics/Drumroll%20-%20Build/dr_build141.jpghttp://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...0-%20Build/dr_ build141.jpg

The weapon motors are being changed to Speed 900s, which although bigger, will fit in straight where the HTIs sat. One of the battery packs will sit under the motors (hidden in the picture by the white strip) while the other pack sits vertically between the first pack and the drill drives:
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c367/ayrshirerobotics/Drumroll%20-%20Build/dr_build144.jpghttp://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...0-%20Build/dr_ build144.jpg

The Victor 885 for weapon control now sits between the Electronizes at the rear of the bot, with the radio receiver mounted just behind that:
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c367/ayrshirerobotics/Drumroll%20-%20Build/dr_build148.jpghttp://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...0-%20Build/dr_ build148.jpg

The aerial now mounts to the internal bulkhead via an ali angle bracket as opposed to being previously attached to the top panel (meaning I couldnt remove the top panel completely without first unscrewing the wire from the RX to the aerial mount):
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c367/ayrshirerobotics/Drumroll%20-%20Build/dr_build151.jpghttp://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...0-%20Build/dr_ build151.jpg

Drivewise its ready to run at its next event; the only work still to do is to buy and fit the weapon motors, and get a new drum made as the current one is a bit dodgy

Critical Damage will be getting new HDPE armour and a bit of chassis strengthening (and probably a simple weapon) but no work has started on that yet - will post an update when progress is made :)

Team Terminal Damage
http://www.ayrshirerobotics.vze.comwww.ayrshirerobotics.vze.com

Looks all awesome, sir Jamie. :)

Update

Just bought the fourteen cordless drills that were on eBay (thanks owed to Tom Armitage for pointing out the link :))
Drumroll had some stripped plastic gears in its drill gearboxes after the FW champs so I changed them to all-metal gears. This used up the last of the spare parts from the nine 9.6V drill motors I bought from Gimson Robotics a couple of years back and so my stocks have been in need of replenishment :)

One of the fourteen cordless drill motors I know to be 12V - the other thirteen will have to wait until I can read the descriptions on the cases. Typical though that I buy a large quantity of robot bits to mess about with when Im meant to be revising but oh well! It was too good a deal to pass up.

Four may be used in a new feather design that ideally Id like to have ready for Thinktank (mainly because its been designed as a Beauty 2 eliminator :)) but I may not have time to get it running; will post any progress on here.

Just need to find a use for the other ten motors :P

Team Terminal Damage
http://www.ayrshirerobotics.vze.comwww.ayrshirerobotics.vze.com

Lol,I was thinking about buying them!

Update -2>(Just a small one)

Drumroll served its house robot apprenticeship today, performing alongside The Squirtinator at a Haven park tour show. It was blatantly outshone by The Squirtinator and its water cannon of doom but spent plenty of time bullying the little robots. On a serious note it gave me about an hours worth of drive time (non-stop, thumb started to ache after a while :)) which would make you think Id be spot on at driving it now but I still feel theres room for improvement on that front :P

Motors got a good run and the batteries got nicely discharged, so I hope to get a few more cycles in to get them in top condition for when the drums running again.

In other news, Ive got my hands on the fourteen drills from eBay:

http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c367/ayrshirerobotics/Random/DSCN3656.jpghttp://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...m/DSCN3656.jpg

Spent this evening undoing reverse screws/chucks/drill casings and now have seven hammer drill motors/gearboxes and two normal gearboxes (couldnt get the reverse screws out the other five drills :P)

http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c367/ayrshirerobotics/Random/DSCN3657.jpghttp://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...m/DSCN3657.jpg

Motor voltages are:
2 x 12V
2 x 14.4V
10 x 16.8V
so Ill have to have a play around and decide what motors to use for what etc

Thats enough for now, time for me to stop procrastinating!

yes Jamie...

Drumroll, did very well on wednesday !!

Thanks again !!

John

Update

Drumroll has now been fitted with Speed 900s for the weapon drive:

http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c367/ayrshirerobotics/Drumroll%20-%20Build/dr_build156.jpghttp://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...0-%20Build/dr_ build156.jpg
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c367/ayrshirerobotics/Drumroll%20-%20Build/dr_build158.jpghttp://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...0-%20Build/dr_ build158.jpg

A new top panel has been made out of 8mm HDPE to prevent axes getting through to the vitals again. I forgot to take some pics of the finished piece so my CAD (cardboard-aided-design) pics wil have to do for now:

http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c367/ayrshirerobotics/Drumroll%20-%20Build/dr_build162.jpghttp://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...0-%20Build/dr_ build162.jpg

Fins have been added on top, mostly for visual purposes - only time will tell if they serve any useful purpose :)

The weapon transmission will be changing from timing belts and pulleys to chain and sprocket drive
a) because I have the parts to form a suitable gear ratio with the chain and sprockets and
b) because I always think robots with visible chain drives look cool

Ive got a 1m length of the 8mm Technobots stuff so Im going to get round to shortening it to the required length. What would the best way to do this?
I dont have a vice handy to clamp it in, so do you think it would work if I clamped the chain onto my workbench with a couple of pairs of mole grips on either side of the link which Im going to remove the pin from, and then drive the pin through?
Is a parallel pin punch my best option of tool to use for this?
And what do roboteers use/do at events when they have a chain snap and then repair it for the next bout?

Thanks,
Jamie

Team Terminal Damage
http://www.ayrshirerobotics.vze.comwww.ayrshirerobotics.vze.com

You could always sneak into B&Q and use their chain breaking tools when the staff arent looking :proud:

The fins look extremely cool, as do the insides...nice robot you have there really :P very compact and neatly arranged.

I regret I cant say anything useful to you here, sorry :)

its a very powerful spinner there Jamie!

Certainly not the most powerful out there but hopefully not the worst. Im aiming more for reliability with this upgrade than power. I got tired of getting one hit in before the weapon motors broke and having to replace them after every fight at the last competition

Jamie, to break up my chain I use a pair of needle nose pliers, a small nut a centre punch and a hammer.

Put the nut under one side of the chain and use the punch part bash out a pin in the right place. Then Twist the loose link out of the way turn over and repeat until it is broken.

To re join, Hold the nut in the needle nose and use the hammer to hit the nut around the link hole so that the pin pops in the the hole, turn over and repeat.

Seem long winded, but seems to work, no need for split links only had one failure on 4 chains in 2 years in DB5, which was last weekend. But the chains really need replacing now.

im lazy. i use an angle grinder to get of the top of the pin, then drive the rest of the pin out with a nail or somthing small enough i have to hand.. then put the chain back together with a split link. i use 3/8th chain in maxus.. similar to the 8mm stuff you have in size and i havnt broken any while driving around so far. but ive only really been pushing fws around and slaming into walls etc.

chain splitter? it has a T handle and you just screw it in with your hand, then the pin just pushs out then when need to put back toegther turn the splitter the other way and screw in to push the pin back in

Chain Splitter, thought that was a hammer and punch :)

lol yea if your a pieky

Thanks for the feedback guys.

I looked at chain splitters online but most of them seemed to be for sizes in the motorbike chain region so I wasnt sure if the 8mm stuff would be a bit small. But Ive seen a couple for 3/8th chain so if 8mm is similar in size to that then it may well work.

Think Ill try the homebrew method of a hammer and nail/centrepunch/pointy thing first and see how that goes - if I get frustrated Ill probably buy a chain splitter :)

Muchos gracias

Go for the home brew method.

I tried a while back to find a chain splitter that would have been suitable for some 8mm chain. I think the one I found was so overly expensive that there was no point in buying it.

Loving the new weapon motors! Fancy a 1 on 1 with hornet at some point? :)

Anytime! :)
Never much of a fan of shirking a challenge. Plus the last spinner I took on was Little Spinner when the old chassis was still on the go so the new one hasnt really had the chance to prove how well it can stand up (or not stand up!) to spinners.

Got a slab of 20mm Hardox delivered today to form the teeth of the new drum, so once thats all machined and made (and Ive been eliminated from competition fights :P) then Ill throw it into the arena with Hornet :)

Lol awesome.

Who knows, you might be meeting hornet 36V :)

Now you tell me! :crazy:

Would that be Hornet on A123s?
I was reading through the lithium battery thread last night (well, until my laptop froze, wouldnt restart after ten times, and I threw it on the floor in frustration/anger - oops) with a view to upgrading to them because Im not sure if the Nimhs will restrict the motors from performing at their top potential. Need to do a few tests when I get the new drum fitted first though

(Message edited by K_C_R on November 14, 2008)

Drumroll has now been entered into the Rebel Robots featherweight Championships on the 7th February 2009. With six other spinners entered so far, it should hopefully be a smashing show :)

Update

I cobbled together the old drum over the weekend as I was keen to have a quick test of the Speed 900s to see how they perform. The drum was horribly unbalanced but it was still able to spin. I was running on timing belts and pulleys on a 4:1 ratio. Having read through the lithium use thread a couple of weeks ago I noted that Hannibaltion 3 runs its drive on a 4.5:1 ratio so I wasnt expecting the drum to be spinning much faster than a nippy drive wheel. However it did have enough kick in it to happily toss the target chassis around the back garden.

The fins displayed in my last update post have now been attached and have gone beyond purely cosmetic use. One instance when the drum hit the target chassis, the chassis flew up and would have gone over Drumroll but instead got stopped by the fins and fell back on to the drum resulting in another impact!
So it appears that the fins may well serve as a snare to stop anyone flying over the top of the robot :)
I did design the fins a little with that in mind but was unsure if it would work or not

There was plenty of torque in the drum at the 4:1 ratio but I am going to sacrifice that for speed and try out a 2.5:1 ratio. Going to stick with pulleys for the moment as its easier to modify them to fit the 6mm output shaft of the Speed 900s. All sprockets above ten teeth (on Technobots) have a bore of more than 6mm so Id have to make some sort of collar or similar to suit, whereas I can just drill a hole in the pulleys

I have a video of the test and a couple of pictures but theyre stuck on my camera just now since my laptops down and out and I cant upload them.

Meanwhile after the test I dismantled Drumroll right down to the bare chassis. I began marking out areas that I could cut out of the nylon to reduce weight as its starting to creep up and predictions are that with the new drum it will be roughly a kilo overweight. I didnt get time to cut everything out before having to come back up to uni but one nylon bulkhead weighed half a kilo before and after slimming it is now weighing in at 250g while still retaining its structural strength. Once I cut and drill out everything else, I hope to have lost around 750g. It may not sound a lot but every little helps

sounds good look forward to the video

how tall is drumroll?:)

Keep that claw away from it! :lame:

Main chassis height is 90mm, about 140mm to the top of the fins, and probably (just a guess) 250mm-275mm with the roll cage on.

Thats probably a perfect munching height for Crumple Zone - thankfully Crumple Zone has three other less-lethal sides that I can go for :)

alex, do u own venom?

o 4get that i saw a pic of it on your website but its under pictures not your bots page

(Message edited by john on November 26, 2008)

quote:

Having read through the lithium use thread a couple of weeks ago I noted that Hannibaltion 3 runs its drive on a 4.5:1 ratio so I wasnt expecting the drum to be spinning much faster than a nippy drive wheel.

The trick is, I drive slowly. :)

That makes sense...having the Speed 900s on that sort of ratio is very fast indeed, but since Im using the motors for a spinner, Im gonna be going for even more speed! :)

Ive resorted to doing what I do every time exams roll around - start designing robots! I think its the fact that Im consciously aware that Im supposed to be studying that I try not to get distracted by other stuff, but I fail every time :)

Anyway, Im now toying with the idea of getting the next incarnation of Kaizer up and running. A brief bit of history: http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c367/ayrshirerobotics/UKRG%202006/kaizer_pits1.jpg>Kaizer Mk1 was the first robot built by Team Terminal Damage that moved away from the Rexs Robot Challenge era of the team. Drill motors, 4WD, speed controllers - it became changed times.
Mk1 was built to compete in the 2006 UK Robotic Games. Building the robot was a good learning process but it was not up to the rigours of open featherweight combat.
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c367/ayrshirerobotics/Kaizer%20Mk2%20-%20Build/k2_build72.jpg>Mk2 was the upgraded version, designed to suit the open circuit but some plonker (who could that be? :crazy:) used 2mm aluminium chequer plate as the main chassis material meaning it buckled and bent easily, and several axe hits and beatings from raptor spinners later it became clear that retirement time was upon it.
After that I focused on getting Drumroll running reliably and effectively and now that its almost there, I think its time to bring Kaizer back into the action.

I really liked the look of Mk2, with the side bumper rails and paint job, so Ill be aiming to keep a similar look to the new one. However, itll be increased in size as Mk2 was small and hideously underweight. Going to stick with 4WD, and will have some form of lifting weapon on it.
My initial plan is to stick a linear actuator in it and have Panic Attack style forks at the front. My overall desired plan (which might take a few practice runs to get right) is to have a 4-bar-lifter in there, probably powered by a Speed 900 transmitting through a threaded rod.

With exams before Christmas this year, I have my holidays free to roboticize so hopefully a new batch of build pictures will be on their way soon :)

Jamie
Team Terminal Damage
http://www.ayrshirerobotics.vze.comwww.ayrshirerobotics.vze.com

How come Drumroll isnt invertible?

Hi Lewis,

The current chassis height is 90mm, the drum is 114mm and the wheels are 75mm, so invertibility doesnt really work :)
However I have my reasons for having such small wheels and sacrificing invertibility.

The first incarnation of Drumroll (basically before it had the drum) had 100mm blue wheels but the robot was very fast, so much so that most of the time it was uncontrollable. The best way I figured to drop the speed was to decrease the wheel diameter, plus the 100mm wheels took up too much space in the new chassis. I had used a roll-cage in a previous competition and it worked flawlessly so I decided to keep the smaller wheels for increased controllability, then add a roll-cage to deal with the self-righting. I toyed with the idea of a self-righting arm or a second set of wheels (similar to Crushtacean) but they were too much hassle and too heavy. The roll-cage is lightweight and effective so Ive stuck with that.

However its still an issue that Im not fully settled with, and after having seen how other drumbots deal with invertibility (I was impressed with the design of Proteus, a US drumbot) when its comes time to give Drumroll a new chassis, I will be taking the invertible approach

Cool :)

Well the Rebel Robots draw is up as you probably all have seen. Kaizer Mk.3 gets a baptism of fire by being drawn in the same heat as Kishar, Pillow Torque and Hornet 2. Ive never fought against Kishar or Pillow Torque but one has an immensely powerful spinning disc and one has Astroflight C40s for drive. And then of course, theres just the small matter of Hornet 2. Easiest heat Ill ever have! :uhoh:

Maybe I shouldnt be writing off my hopes just yet however. The chassis of Kaizer Mk.3 will be made up of interlocking bulkheads of HDPE, 12mm thick. That should hopefully stand up to a good few hits from Kishars blade. Same goes for Hornet 2, although I expect to be tossed around a lot in that fight so Ill need to make sure my internal connections are all up to the impact stresses. Kaizer will be out-maneouvred, out-run, and out-pushed by Pillow Torque (to be expected when you put cordless drill motors against Astroflight C40s) but you never know, a quick slide under of the lifting forks, a charge against the wall and you could have yourself one stacked robot :)

Drumroll got drawn against Pain In The Asp, Tuff Luck 2 and Hooligan. Pain In The Asp is the one I reckon could cause me most damage. Tuff Luck 2 will be resiliant to attacks with its hardox shell and Hooligan is a bit of an unknown quantity although I have seen footage of it in action. Its got three flat sides and the front wedge so could be a bit challenging to gain purchase but the design of the new teeth for Drumroll will hopefully be able to grab it somewhere.

Jamie
Team Terminal Damage

where did you see the draw.
looked at the rebel robots site couldnt find it.
ta
ROB....

Hi Rob,

Its in the Rebel Robots thread in the FRA General Chatter section:
http://www.fightingrobots.co.uk/discus/messages/59/14504.html?1229373928http://www.fightingrobots.co.uk/disc...tml?1229373928

Smash is in a fun heat :)

:):):)

thanks Jamie :proud:

Update

Kaizer is coming along steadily (Ive got pics but not uploaded them yet - soon hopefully though). The chassis is pretty much complete; needs armour coverings to finish it off. The insides still need a lot of work - most of the time so far has been spent on parts for the lifting mechanism. I got it all finished and did a trial run tonight. Without a load on the forks, it lifts smoothly and briskly, got just over 90 of movement.

Under load is a different story however; even though the batteries were a little drained, the linear actuator struggled to lift a 9.5kg Drumroll. The front bulkhead started to bend meaning the lifting force was lost. Part of this is down to the leverage ratio used and the fact that the actuator is rated at only 40kg.
Having a slight rethink, I decided to try and see if an Okin Deltadrive actuator would fit in its place - and its a perfect substitute - all 8000N force of it :proud:
Got the spare weight so with a little modification, it should be in place tomorrow. Its considerably slower than the Linac model I was using but hey it works.

Ive also come to realise that great though HDPE is for armour, its not ideal for load-bearing structural components and chassis members. It deforms too easily so when I upgrade Kaizer to a 4-bar-lifter, if I still choose to use plastics I will opt back to Nylon for various parts of the chassis.

On the Drumroll front, its almost all ready to go. Drive is fine, weapon motors are fine, drum is on its way this coming week so it should just be a case of fitting it in place and away we go. Weight will be an issue so Ill need to have a look and see what needs to go and where best to take it from. If the worst comes to the worst, Ill drop a Speed 900, although that would reduce the performance of the drum which wouldnt do the quality of manufacturing of the drum much justice.
Other than that, the robot is looking cool with some body enhancements. Im keeping pics under wraps just now (with exception of a couple of people Ive shown on MSN :lame:) so youll just have to wait until Rebel Robots to see the new look :)

Toodles for now,
Jamie

http://www.ayrshirerobotics.vze.comwww.ayrshirerobotics.vze.com

Update

Well Drumrolls drum arrived on Wednesday, but I had to hold off until Friday to get my hands on it. Firstly, its a superb piece of engineering from ALK Engineering a.k.a Mr. Kenny :)
Its very rugged and much better than the old version (which isnt hard!). Its got bearings fitted this time, so it runs very smoothly on the shaft. It also weighs in at 4.2kg, 1.7kg more than the old drum. This, however, puts the robot in at 13.8kg without the self-righting hoops so Ill probably have to go for a thinner top panel as Ive removed almost all the weight I can from the chassis.

The single biggest weight now (excluding the drum) is the rear armour which is 2kg. Might have to swap that for some ti after Rebel Robots to lighten things up. The other option is to remove a Speed 900 but after todays tests Im loathed to do that :P

Got the drum spinning after tensioning some rather loose belts. Its looking deadly and could cause some lovely damage :)
However when testing it (which resulted in the old drum getting thrown right across the garden and the old chassis about halfway) one of the battery packs, which were sitting loosely on top as Id been using them in Kaizer, jumped up with the impact of the drum and fell into the path of one of the teeth! It fell out the robot but I didnt notice the impact and thought it was just shock from the hit that made it fly out. Nope - two minutes later, hiss hiss smoke smoke, Id wrecked one of my cells. So I now need to get a replacement pack (dont have an iron suitable for the job, plus I can keep the duffed pack as spare cells) before I can test Drumroll out again.

But all is looking well so far :D

I was gonna say a bit more but Im tired so Im off to bed! :)

Jamie

http://www.ayrshirerobotics.vze.comwww.ayrshirerobotics.vze.com

Yowch! Sounds like a we got one deadly drummer on the block! :)

Good luck with it, Jamie. Really impressive so far. :)

we need a video!!!!!! PLEASE iw ould also agree about the excellent work Kenny can do

Lol welcome to the wonderful world of smoking batteries in spinning machines jamie :proud:

Sounds good......so....uhhh....how is kaizer looking? :)