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Didn't think the glue would work, but it was worth a shot! Thanks for the help there Mario!
When you say about the screws too Niels, do you mean the one in the centre of the wheel, or screwed into the actual motor itself? Might look into getting that done, will definitely help hold it together a bit nicer!
Niels refers to the M8 in the center of the wheel.
Ah, got you. I'll give it a look tomorrow when I get to building the machine properly. Hopefully should have some decent photos tomorrow to show how it's progressing!
Very quick update here (apologies, don't have a whole lot of time)
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BhwZYTSIUAA6q_v.jpg
(https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BhwZYTSIUAA6q_v.jpg:large)
HardWired II's taking shape very nicely. Sadly it's just a boring brick, but it'll be a very fast boring brick, and a very bright one at that. Plans going forward are:
Dishwasher side baseplate to provisionally mount all the electronics and drive to.
--> use that as a template for a 2-3mm stainless steel baseplate I'm having cut, because I can't cut the sheet I had on my own
High intensity LED strips, lots of them. Blue, all around the edges, going to make this thing light up like a christmas tree if the amp draw isn't too high, make it look a bit different.
Thicker side armour - probably just adding more HDPE to the side to give a total of 40mm thick. Maybe more, depending whether it's still in weight. As it stands, it's quite a lot under if my scales are right, so I'm just going to be piling it on as much as I can.
Top plate. Not sure what yet, motors stick out about 1mm above the edges, depending how I mount them. Would like HDPE but 2mm HDPE is probably not the best idea, especially if my motors are close to the top. Considering the number of hammers and axes I've seen thus far, I probably need the same 2mm stainless steel, minimum...
After that, it's just wiring things up and replacing my chocolate block connectors with better ones so I can clip things in and out (though I don't have any spares so may just do it for the battery) and then buying a LiPo sack for charging and building a cradle to make sure I'm within the rules.
Not far to go now!
God this looks a bit posh. Do you have any plans for a speedo (like which one will run those beer cans etc.)?
40mm thick!? that things going to be a tank, it's looking really nice and very compact, what are the dimensions it looks really small?
High intensity lights, not blindingly bright I hope? Won't be popular if we can't see the fight due to your mobile disco :).
based on the motors i guess the machine is 40cm wide, 45cm long and 8 cm high
LOL, mobile disco
Maybe add in a speaker too :)
You don't need 40mm, it's unnecessary extra weight. I've got 30mm on Ricochet, nothing getting through that.
I've got 50mm! (2x2 tho ;P)
Yours is as thick as mine is high lol
On topic, looking solid man. I say go 40mm if you got weight. Purely because you can :)
Thanks for all the comments!
Just to respond to some questions -
Dave, Thanks! I've got a pair of BotBitz TZ85A's to run the motors (S900 sized I think), on a Turnigy 4S 5000mAh battery, 30C discharge (fused for 100A) and 80mm wheels there abouts, should be pretty nippy I hope!
MrSam, I'll get the actual dimensions when I can, it's about 380x250 for the box itself, and then the shovel itself makes it about 380x380 square-ish. Just estimating of course, but it's quite small, just a tad wider than HardWired I!
Razerdave, I'll be unpopular? That's a shame, I really wanted a form of weaponry on my robot :( Haha, I'm kidding! Just enough to give a nice blue glow through 40mm thick HDPE, or failing that I'll sandwich them between the two 20mm sides... They're all going to be internally mounted, apart from a single surface mounted green LED (for rule purposes) right next to the fuse (link) which'll just be of the normal variety!
Harry, is it really? I feel like I've overdone it a bit now haha! Massacre's pretty low though, don't think anyone's going to escape that bar! Thanks too, even though I might not even need that much, I'm going to just pile it on all the sides 'till I hit 13.5 kilos! Probably not going to push it up to 13.6 purely because I need to account for differences in my numbers - I don't actually have any scales to properly weigh the robot (bathroom scales just say 'error') so I'm having to weigh it using a luggage hook type thing which could be a little bit out...
Only things I need to get now are the connectors (I don't know if chocolate blocks will cause me to fail the tech check) and higher gauge wiring so that I'm well within the rules. At the minute, I use twin earth wire or something, which looks up the job but I'm not 100%... Will post pictures and stuff soon!
Also, just as a question to anyone who has a pushbot or a wedge on their machine, how much ground clearance is best for the RoboChallenge arena? The whole machine has quite a large amount of clearance at the back (it actually has a slight slant forward, so technically it's a wedge I guess) but it has some at the front still, not being flush with the floor - is it best to have a zero ground clearance or to have at least a little bit so it doesn't get caught on the floor panels?
Highest part of the ground clearance on Satanix is 5mm, only been beached once, that was on the pit lid, but not sure if I was stuck on it, or a random bolt.
Ah, I see - I've got a lot more than that at the back (8mm) so I think I'll be alright on that one!
Is the front of Satanix a zero ground clearance for the wedge parts?
Yeah, the wedges sat on the ground, but the robot did wheely, hence I added the hinged ones, they remain in contact with the floor when the robot rocks (soon to be held down with magnets).
Might have to make a slight adjustment to my front then, I have a bit of clearance at the front, probably not going to end well for me 9 times out of 10! For the next version of this, I might implement a similar system, not really got time to do it now but I can see that'd be pretty useful...
I have no doubts that my machine won't be able to get underneath other machines as efficiently as other pushers, but hopefully I'll be able to put up a fight!
Slight update, stainless steel plate still not here, however I am going to make a baseplate from a side of dishwasher and see how that stands up, probably not well but then I can use it as a template!
As a sidenote, work has slightly begun on my new beetleweight, which I'm provisionally calling Abandon because it sounds cool, hopefully that's not been taken yet... I've started designing it, hopefully to be a full-bodied spinner with a bit of a twist that'll probably make it a force to be reckoned with - more soon!
Looking at a couple of options for active weaponry again for HardWired II, even if it's purely for the aesthetic value. Most likely thing at the minute is some kind of spinning thing, powered by a car fan motor if I can find one cheap (and I mean, dead cheap...) Either that or a rather light drum powered by a drill motor might work - this is probably all going to be interchangeable I should mention. A claw powered by one of the linear actuators I have might work too, though it would literally just be for gripping, not crushing!
Rather late in the day to be changing stuff around, but hopefully it works!
If you can fit the linear actuator inside your current box you could look into a sideway lifter. It will offcourse only work if you can get completely under your opponent and will double as a selfrighter to get your wedge back into play.
I've got a claw I fancy selling if you want it?
If you decide on the drum, rather than the drill motor i've got a speed 700 laying around, they're more powerful than your standard drill motor and it has a 5mm shaft that would be a bit more sturdy.
The sideways lifter sounds an interesting one, might have a look at that!
Thanks too for the offers there, I'll let you both know if I manage to design something in to it - what I'm looking for really is cheap, simple and not too heavy since I've got some Speed 900s for drive... I don't mind really if it ends up as more of a novelty than anything, but it'd be nice to at least have something on it!
Did some more work on HardWired II today, and it's not good news.
The machine is an absolute travesty, and I can see it getting wrecked by 90% of the machines in the championships. Dare I say, the only machines it'll stand up to are the horizontal spinners, weirdly.
I'll list the problems as they appeared throughout the day:
The chassis has warped. This is really only cosmetic, and doesn't impact the performance of it thankfully, but it isn't half annoying...
Shovel has a 5mm clearance. Partly to do with the twisted chassis, now fixed, though with a 1mm clearance since the scoop itself isn't flush with the floor, I need a grinder to just adjust slightly but I don't have one or indeed anything to amend with) which means that my robot's main strength, the huge drive motors, won't be much use against anything with a lower scoop, such as the legions of flippers and other rambots. Speaking of which:
The drive motors are exposed, which is a very, very, very, very bad thing. I don't have any spares whatsoever, and due to the way it's designed, it's a choice between having thin armour and invertibility, or thicker armour and no invertibility. I did look into both making the wheels larger and different kinds of armour, but to get the necessary clearance to drive upside I'd need something that was no more than 2mm thick which puts my motors in a very dodgy position. Of course, I could look at a self-righting mechanism but, to follow on the chain of events...
I've run out of budget. That's it, I'm stuck with these parts now to resolve the situation. I can't use the Linacs I bought from Mario because they take 24v, and I don't have the weight or money for a 24v battery. The ONLY solution I have to the srimech problem is to use the drills from HardWired I, but that's pushing it in the space I have now, and bearing in mind that I can't afford any more parts until GSL I don't think it'll be doable. Of course, I could always go with no srimech and thick armour on the top, but I have no zero ground clearance on the front scoop and no srimech which is just a loss waiting to happen.
So yeah, if you draw up against HardWired II, you've got yourself a free win! Extremely frustrated with the whole thing now, and I've still got to buy a LiPo sack (to be within the rules) with approximately £0.00 so that should be fun...
Why don't you use 2mm stainless steel for the top plate?
You could even use 2mm steel over the top then have some thicker hdpe/wood underneath with cutouts round the motors, although this means they are only protected by the steel it will give the top a lot more stiffness and resistance to bending, you just have a slight risk of getting the motors hit by an axe but that's part of the game!
i can bring my angle grinder to gls and you can sort it there if you want
also can you rought round the inner edge of the chassis to put a thicker plate in
The LiPo sack is easely replaced with a tin box, like a breadbox or cookiecan. Even a large tin can with lid will do.
And 2mm 15Mo3 steel is available at the price of a beer...
If I come up against you I won't go crazy with the axe
Just because an actuator is 24v doesn't mean it has to be run on that, I run mine on 18v and it's absolutely fine.
A 24V linac run at 4S is about half the speed and a quarter of the power. Not funny in the end.
Btw, you can get lipo sacks from hobbyking for a quid or so
http://www.hobbyking.com/hobbyking/s...4_x_23_cm.html
Hope this helps :)
Also, dont be so negative, its still a very capable robot. With s900s for drive it'll still be really fast. And with that much hdpe, it could still take a beating from some spinners and still come out ok.
Its better than anything ive built (arduino, 5 quid motors, random battery, heavy steel box, zip-ties and tape - Shred 1 and 2 in a nutshell :) )
Thanks for the response, everyone. Have to apologise, that was the effect of a bad day and me panicking slightly because my design all fell apart, after all that work. Guess that's the name of the game, especially in combat robotics, but it isn't half a pain when it'd take me another few weeks to get things sorted. Just a further note, for whatever reason the chassis has bent even further out, and I need to really work at getting it back into shape somehow if I intend to go back to that HDPE structure. Next time, I'll probably use something to get the parts a little more precise and change where I store the thing. It's most likely the warmer weather recently and the slight inaccuracy of the build that's both compounded and caused issues...
It is now being sorted though, and hopefully will still be able to make the championships with a finished machine! Might be still applying paint on the way down, but done all the same...
Thanks for the advice regarding LiPo sacks too, everyone! Will look into those, should be alright in the end, I hope... more updates soon, haven't got a lot of time at the minute, Uni's taking its toll quite severely...
Do you know the ratio on the S900s?
I think it's 4.5:1 but I recall Mario saying they run at about 10,000 RPM at 12v so they're a bit faster than Graupner S900s or something along those lines, I'm running them at 4S. I think they're Johnson 900 size motors as opposed to the Graupner ones (I just call them S900s for the ease of it) but I could be mistaken there... I can't really remember!
keep going buddy your doing really well :)
Ok then
Keep going with the build, it looks great :)
Thanks! By the time it's done, I honestly think the only thing I'll have done is drive it... Huge thanks for all the help, everyone who has done by the way!
That said, I am thinking of putting together scraps of parts together to try and have a whiteboard only machine put together, using my old (broken-ish) ESCs, drill motors and radio gear with HDPE for the structural stuff and some acryllic I have laying about, mainly for spinner fodder and testing H2 on since I've decided I'd like to keep HardWired I relatively intact instead of taking it down to the whiteboards...
HardWired II lives!
Pretty major change-up this late in proceedings, but it's definitely all for the better. Would just like to give an absolutely huge thanks to Mario for all the help here, since HardWired II would be a very different machine without the help, and not in a good way either. The HDPE chassis has distorted even more, so if I'd have stuck with it, it'd be unusable by this point anyway. So, here's the new look HardWired II!
http://i1355.photobucket.com/albums/...ps26d98b95.jpg
Made entirely of Hardox, thicker on the scoop at the front (I think about 6mm, but it's late so I may be mis-quoting!) so it should be able to stand up to even the scariest of spinners, which are becoming more and more abundant by the year, worryingly... Of course, it still needs paint, and I'm going to be putting slightly thicker bike tread on it to give me a little more ground clearance on the top - perhaps adding some little spikes on the front to catch other machines, Bonx style, but they're all just minor things now. Link just needs placing in there (on the top plate I think) and the LED needs wiring into my system too, and we should be good to go!
The electronics are all still the same, speed 900-size motors running on 4S using TZ85As. I can't remember the ratios to the wheels but in all it should be pretty nippy across the arena. Just got to get practising now, and getting everything else ready for the champs like the charging cradle and all that.
Oh, and team shirts. I made a logo in a few spare minutes at Uni:
http://i1355.photobucket.com/albums/...ps3d0b0000.png
Going to be painting that onto the back of the machine, most likely, and the paint scheme's going to be white, with blue and yellow highlights because I quite like the look of it!
As for the remaining HDPE I have from the old HardWired chassis, I'm building that into a robot with 100mm wheels powered by drills and other spare parts from HardWired Evolution, and weighed down to about 14-15 kilos so that I've got a test dummy for any future robots.