Ant Weight

Hey everyone, I figured I might as well make a build diary to ask you all a load more questions and sap you bandwidth with pics :D

If you saw my other post you'll know I have the base of an old rc Tiger tank and have dismantled it in an attempt at making an ant weight.

I've been fiddling with it a bit, now it just needs the electronic parts to make it go... on which note... I still have no idea where to find a suitable controller, since a large number of robots just have a skid steer configuration, what controllers do you guys use? Thanks

and I will upload pics when it decides to work for me....

My robots tend to use either Peter Waller's custom controllers or Sozbots ones, but a good starter option (as I might have suggested earlier) is the Sabertooth 2x5A for RC - http://www.active-robots.com/products/m ... ails.shtml - I used one of these in my first ant with no problems. (it then went on a bit of a journey and presently resides in Andy Jackson's antweight :P)

That will give you skid steering with an option to either drive it tank style or have the control signals mixed so you can control it with one stick on the transmitter.

Dammit, yeah I know what speed controller to use, sorry I mean transmitter... (it's a controller to us less educated folk)

I have the speed controller and receiver on order, should be here shortly, which means the bot will be done shortly apart from means of controlling it...

What reciever have you bought? Then we can tell you what transmitters it's compatible with, hence, which to buy

Futaba 40MHz micro rc

an as promised, pics of my bodge job :)

http://i617.photobucket.com/albums/t...y/CIMG0425.jpg

http://i617.photobucket.com/albums/t...y/CIMG0424.jpg

http://i617.photobucket.com/albums/t...y/CIMG0426.jpg

http://i617.photobucket.com/albums/t...y/CIMG0423.jpg

Update:

I'm made a decision to scrap this and build a bot from scratch instead, not sure what kind of design yet but it'll still just be a simple pushbot type

aaaaand... does anybody here actually know anything about transmitters I keep asking but...
Help would be appreciated on the subject :wink:

that's a bit general. To save me writing an essay on the subject do you have a specific question or two about them in mind?

Yes, where is a good place to get one? do they come as part of the controller (that's the controller you hold) or do you have to find that separately? I'm after a 40MHz one preferably with skid steer style controls 8)

Generally the transmitter and the controller you hold are the same thing :)

Okeydoke, thanks for the replies ;)

One more noob question... Could you use a transmitter built for 2.4GHz or other frequency and put a 40MHz crystal in it? Would it work or not...?

And since this is a build diary: I've nearly completed the robot, after buying a few parts and scavenging bits of plastic etc, I'm not sure yet whether to have a wedge or shovel or otherwise on the front yet :wink: