Cicatrix Build Diary

The weight loss has just been a result of the design. The new drum is shorter, has less teeth and has lighter end-caps whereas the old drum was longer, had four teeth (each being 15mm thick instead of 13mm) and stainless steel endcaps. Not sure what the density of Supralsim 690 is (new drum teeth) compared with Hardox 450 (old drum teeth) but there could be some weight difference there too.

Yeah ideally as much weight in the weapon as possible. The whole robot currently only weighs 11kg I think, so the weight is there to use. Contemplating a beater replacement, making it thick and throwing as much weight as possible into the outer edges.

Make your own build diary Jamie!

Supralsim? Sounds like something from Star Wars. 11kg gives you loads to play with.

No worries Jamie, more interesting than my boring box anyway :sad:

It won't be for long though... Thunderbird 2 is about to switch from pod 1 to pod 2 :lol:

Beginnings of the drum have arrived in the form of a big chunk of pipe.

http://i1214.photobucket.com/albums/...9-13162809.jpg

Going to order a Speed 900 motor too over the next few days to go with the a relay/battleswitch combo.

Now need to get some teeth made, some sort of shaft and all the gears/pulleys sorted.

I'm guessing something along these lines would be ok?
For the drum: http://www.technobotsonline.com/timing-pulley-25t.html
and for the motor: http://www.technobotsonline.com/timing-pulley-10t.html

Noice 8)

I'd go for bigger timing pulleys personally; the 10T pulleys are quite small so it can be difficult securing them to the motor shaft. To keep the 2.5:1 ratio, you could go for a 40T pulley on the drum and a 16T pulley on the motor.

I can't wait to see Pod 4, yellow submersible for the win!

Finally rebuild Cicatrix today but its doing some funny things at the moment, using and XL and an XXL, one in each half of the bot to hopefully make it easier to split in half when the drum pod is built. The complicated electronics are undoubtedly the problem, but that seems to have become the robots trademark, it has only worked properly in 1 fight really (out of 6) and it did very badly on that occasion so the more complicated the better I reckon!

As for the drum pod, i've sent off a few emails to see about getting teeth made and was just about to post a thread about which websites were selling the real Speed 900's when I noticed Dave had already done so. Also need to get those pulleys ordered at some point, as well as bearings. What would people recommend for the bearings? Also, have I forgotten anything? Or should I say, what have I forgotten?

i think im right in saying for bearings it depends on if you are using a dead or live shaft as in will the shaft spin or will the drum spin on a fixed shaft

Regardless of whether the shaft is fixed or spinning, you'll probably find what you need on http://www.bearingboys.co.uk/

Got needle roller bearings from them for the original Drumroll's drum and they're dirt cheap and haven't failed yet (to my knowledge).
I read reviews that said they're only useful up to a certain RPM and aren't as good at sustaining shock impacts or loads but I much prefer them to typical ball bearings and will be reverting back to them on Drumroll II.

Having a fixed shaft provides much more structural support than having a spinning shaft as you can use it as a connecting rod between your two bulkheads. Having the shaft spinning means that you have bearings inside the bulkheads instead of the drum but it's not as solid a setup. At the time of designing Drumroll, the majority of the American drumbots - and notably the most successful ones - all used fixed shafts, which is why I opted for that method.

Other than that, you need the shaft, the drum, a pulley for the drum, a pulley for the motor and a belt. Don't think you've forgotten anything major. From your drum transmission you'll have your motor, motor controller (ESC, relay etc) which will then link back to the receiver, so nothing missing that I can see.

I'd recommend needle roller bearings I used cast flange bearings and they are really heavy but needle roller bearings are much much lighter

tony do you still need a new hydraulic reservoir for eric? i've got a couple lying around

Indeed I do Jonny, few pictures would be excellent if you have any :) .

Will do today :)

black one is steel, the silver one is aluminium

http://i990.photobucket.com/albums/a...m/IMG_0508.jpg

Nice one Jonny, cheers :)

The one Eric uses seems to be free to move with the liquid as it is moved so not sure how a solid one would work. But saying that, I know nothing really about Hydraulics so I really should ask someone in the know.

Hopefully it comes to pass that they're ok though. What are you looking for for one of em?

10 pounds each or 2 for a tenner plus postage :proud:

50% bulk discount on 2 items?(!)

I would say that 2 for a tenner is definitely better than 1 for a tenner :lol: .

I really need to contact someone in the hydraulics know-how. I will do that today so I can get back to you ASAP :) . If they give me the all clear, you're on :D

Very small update just because I haven't done one in a while.

Eric Jr and Cicatrix will hopefully be appearing at a local charity event on Saturday, along with 2 of the Combat Penguin Antweight kits.

Cicatrix:

Sources some bits for the drum pod but still on the hunt for a few things for it, hope to get it done before the next UK FW Champs, having a rambot is becoming a bit boring (even if I only have had 6 fights with it). Its running on an XL and XXL in each pod at the moment, pretty quick, pretty powerful but the electrics are stupidly complicated and strangely putting a spinner on will actually simplify it.

Eric Jr:

Hasn't ever really worked very well, one of the motors is LOUD and it really needs new wheels. Also the battery has died so will need a new one. Looking to build an outer HDPE coat for him too, which will allow me to keep the polycarbonate shell for education projects as it lets people see into the internal workings of the bot.

So basically, after saturday i'll be taking it all apart to replace/repair the various problems it has and also removing the LED's from the front.

Eric, Scar:

Haven't done a lot to them really, not had the time and won't have the ability to do anything until a few months time due to my ankle problem

Daiske II:

Leaving that to me team now, will have to wait and see what happens there.




Thats pretty much everything I think as far as the robots are concerned, I will leave you with an ebay purchase I was quite chuffed to come across:

http://i1214.photobucket.com/albums/...0-27181758.jpg

Im genuinely jelious of that jacket

How did you find it?

Just a random search I think and it came up, it was a few weeks ago I found it. :proud: :proud: :proud:

Any pics of Eric Jr?

I'll take some PJ :)

Eric Jr:

http://i1214.photobucket.com/albums/...0-27215237.jpg
http://i1214.photobucket.com/albums/...0-27215307.jpg

I realise that it currently looks nothing like Eric, but thats where the Robo-Coat comes in

Cheers and no it doesn't!

Robo Coat?

I think it was a term Jamie coined, basically its a 6mm HDPE layer of armour that goes over the 10mm polycarb to make it a bit more spinner proof and can be easily removed to leave the polycarb for educational shows as it allows you to see inside at whats happening. I just need to get around a few problems with it, for example the door on the top right section that opens for putting the link in and turning the CO2 on/off, dump valve access etc. Obviously access is still needed to that section.

CO2! I want authentic Eric with hydraulics.

Eric might not even be hydraulic for much longer, haven't decided yet, I can't really do any work on any of them for the next 6 weeks anyway :( . Without the accumulator its gonna be a really slow lifter too.

Too heavy and expensive in a FW, the LP system has a good kick to it as it is, something like 120kg at the ram, and thats with no buffer tank. Will possibly add a long coil of tubing to act as a buffer tank instead as we'll be very close to the weight limit with this Robo-Coat as it is. 12.8kg just now I think.

Ah is that how Eric's flipper worked, it had an accumulator. I take it they're now banned.

Coil of piping, that's a neat alternative to a buffer tank.

They are banned yes. It would work without it, I haven't tried yet, but I imagine it would be very slow.

Cheers, can't remember who/what gave me that idea but I just don't have room for another tank so seems like the best solution :)

Theres a little problem with the coil of pipeing idea, it's that you will need about 2m worth of say 10mm pipe to act as an efective buffer, and you need to some how incorporate that in to your design, with out any sharp turns or corners, and it would be pretty hard to do that...

Yup, it will be, probably not possible actually. It'll work fine without one though so isn't too big of an issue.

Well, that didn't go so well.

Eric Jr didn't even make it to the start line after the battery died as did the battery connector on the bot, so that'll all need re-soldered and a new battery. The ants were killed by the Royal Mail so they didn't make it, also the deadline was really just too tight to get them all properly built in time, especially when I didn't really know what to do when I got them. Got one of them kind of working but not really what I was looking for

So it was left to Cicatrix to do the demo, and after about 10 seconds one of the motor terminals managed to break off leaving him only able to go round in circles. Also, the floor wasn't quite flat enough and he got beached regularly.

Ah well, a lot to learn from for next time! :D

Ah the joys of taking your robots out for a spin at a public event swiftly followed by the embarrassment of having them break down/not work/generally fail almost immediately. Been there, done that, got the red face. :roll:

Like you said though, it's a good learning experience and the thing is that the robots don't even need to be moving to generate interest so people will no doubt still have enjoyed it. Was there a good range of costumes in the tennis tourney?

Yeah it was well attended, more than last year even with me on the sidelines. Had all sorts from Zombies to Surgeons and I think there was even someone dressed as a pint of Guinness. Lots of great costumes and good fun all round, can;t ask for more than that.

Cicatrix ripped a lot of paint from the floor of the room it was in too, hope no one notices that :lol: . They worked up until a point where the interest was already generated and I just deactivated them for people to look at, so it wasn't a total failure. Next year we'll have Eric to bring along though and he will have unimpeachable reliability :wink:

Got a lot of messages regarding my molasses rust fix I used on Scar so will post a bit about it on here.

I basically just made a solution roughly 1:10 of molasses sugar and water and let it soak in there for a couple of weeks then blasted it with a jet washer/gave it a clean when I took it out, worked really well and cost me 88p from Asda*. The hardest thing was finding a container big enough. Also, make sure you do something with it after you've taken it out/cleaned it etc as it begins to corrode again surprisingly quickly!


* http://www.mysupermarket.co.uk/asda-com ... _500g.html

Early Christmas for the robots this year:

Heavyweight ESC
http://i1214.photobucket.com/albums/...1-13192041.jpg

Featherweight Spinner Motor
http://i1214.photobucket.com/albums/...1-13192120.jpg

Also in the process of getting the drum designs completed. Jamie has yet again, legendarily, offered to amend the drum designs to suit the robot as it is in practise which we will get made and hopefully get it ready for a Robochallenge event next year. Which is good, because after only 2 events I was getting pretty bored of running a rambot...

Still can't really work on the heavies with this funny ankle, but hoping to fix the problems with Cicatrix before starting work on the drum pod when the drum design is finalised. Eric Jr needs new batteries....will do that sometime too.... :uhoh:

For anyone who hasn't seen these speed controllers in the past, before I send them off to their new owner, I thought i'd take a photo to illustrate the size issues we were having that made me change from 4QD's to a Roboteq.

http://i1214.photobucket.com/albums/...1-15174228.jpg

Tony do you still want the hydraulic tanks ?

I reckon so Jonny.

Right, haven't written anything of note in this for months now. So, I will upload my pictures of the refit of Rover later this evening and also some information about how the Gimson Robotics wheels are working. Got most of it running at the moment, just need to fit a BEC then we're all finished.

Here it how it looked when I got hold of it on sunday:
http://i31.photobucket.com/albums/c3...m/DSCN6300.jpg

More pictures to come in about 3 hours or so :)