Boner

This will be one of those robots that comes back each year 30% scarier and more developed till it ends up pretty much unbeatable.

Well this is the last time the current design will be at competition and it's been running for a good 6 or 7 years now. I'm planning on taking the best parts of the design and jacking up the diameter of the drum from 3 inch to 4 or 5 inch and making a new precision chassis around it.

Had a very productive day today although I didn't get many pictures taken so this update will be text based.

Started the day off frustratingly by breaking my bench vice. Seems it didn't like taking my full weight to tighten up on the 17mm silver steel bar used as an axle.

https://fbcdn-sphotos-a-a.akamaihd.n...11251106_n.jpg

Bought another from B&Q.

Got both ends of the bar threaded to an 11/16 thread. I would have gone for an M17 thread however it's a rare thread to find a tap and die for and so expensive. 11/16 of an inch is essentially around the same ball park and I was able to pick up a tap and die for a tenner off ebay. Happy days.

Threaded some ali plates, screwed them on the ends and screwed them into the bulkheads. No way those are coming loose!

Wired up the drive and ran it around. Initially had issues with channels etc but I noticed that odd noises were coming from one of the motors. Need to have a look inside it and see what's going wrong.

Positioned and mounted both sets of batteries and the three esc.

I left it this evening having cut out the titanium for the weapon motor mount and drilled out the mounting holes on the mill. Need to get it placed tomorrow and then look at a new bearing mount on the front to give additional support for for the motor shaft.

Hoping to get boner finished tomorrow then do the bit of work I need to on 540 for whiteboards.

It's half 11 and I'm done for the night. Wow that was a long day!

Boner is now wired up with the new motor in place and an additional bearing support on the main shaft as I've had twisting issues in the past. Did a spin up test earlier today and boy was it a cracker. Looking back on the data logger on the castle creations esc, the drum got up to 9000rpm and at that speed was only drawing 3amps, yes that's right, 3amps! Spin up time is basically as fast as I can turn the knob on the transmitter.

Swapped out the unusual noise drive motor for a fresh one. Need to speak to Ewan about that as it's only been run in under no load for 15minutes but i'm much happier with the drive.

Started to look at 540 at around half 9 this evening. At 10 I fired up the mill and made a motor mount from nylon. It's not tidy and it's not clever but it works and that's what I'm happy about. Rest of machine isn't an issue. Should have some fun in the whiteboards with it! :)

Pictures and videos below.

http://youtu.be/OpIda_RfRWQ - 540 spin up
http://youtu.be/Lb03My8P_oY - boner spin up (yes that's my foot to stop it dancing off the crate)

http://i.imgur.com/5asNVR0.jpg - boner bulkhead showing smooth pulley and threaded axle
http://i.imgur.com/WmFiaDx.jpg - quick glimpse of the workshop as it stands atm
http://i.imgur.com/lJ7yFVo.jpg - close up of boner

Boner was pretty rad at Yeovil last year... can't begin to understand what it must be like at 9000 RPM!? Can't wait to see it go. 540 too.

Wow, they are two truly fearsome machines... I doubt a box of steel would stand up to them for long. Lucky I'm not entering, I think I'd faint to see them in the flesh-Metal-plastic. Yeah.

Update - Post champs strip down

Not an overly successful champs for me due to a few let downs however it was a fun champs none the less I enjoyed myself and it was good to catch up with everyone.

Spent a couple stripping down boner this evening to see what was good and bad post champs. At the end of the final white board, the drum and drive didn't work and it was essentially dead in the water.

The good
- The batteries are all in good condition although I wouldn't believe the figures that turnigy quote for their nano series. Divide the C discharge ratings by around 10 and you have the genuine figure
- The turnigy 85a speed controllers that I reprogrammed are still in one piece and work well. I can easily see these being the standard for featherweights now
- The body is all in one piece with no real damage bar the self inflicted damage on the top after it rotated into the drum
- The drum spins just as freely as ever, in fact better than it ever has
- After replacing the brushless motor shaft it's still spinning perfectly
- I didn't burn out a brushless speed controller!

The bad
- The gimsons........well I managed to nacker 3 of the 24v motors, all three went "crunchy", sounded odd and then finally nackered themselves (in two cases they went bad before they had even seen battle!). I poured the carbon brushes from one out of the cooling holes of one of them. The gearboxes are still in one piece and rotate freely enough. I get the feeling that the motors are no good being hard mounted with the all metal gearbox, it's basically all too stiff for what boner puts it through (vertical shocks)

Pics to follow.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by typhoon_driver

I get the feeling that the motors are no good being hard mounted with the all metal gearbox, it's basically all too stiff for what boner puts it through (vertical shocks)

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I came to the same conclusion with the GR01s I used in Drumroll last year. Even though the GR01 assemblies are Nylon, everything was so rigid when mounted that there was no 'give' in the setup and, although it doesn't hit as hard as Boner, the shocks going through Drumroll were not being absorbed in any way by the drives. Since going back to standard drills and mounting methods the problem hasn't resurfaced (just a different drive problem now).

All in all though, it's pretty good going. Coming out of the event with just the drive motors being the issue isn't the worst result possible.

Beauty had the same issue with the Gimson, the gearbox seem fine but the motor failed (and took out 2 speedos along the way).

Being metal isn't the problem, 720 had some massive hits and the gearboxes are fine... You get what you pay for though... Banebots are better.

The gearboxes are fine. It's the motors that haven't lasted and that's what I was getting at, it appears as though the 24v gimson motors aren't great at take the shocks