Hello,
I want to design a new robot, which will be a nice one, but the question is how do you design a robot from scratch?
I am confused with it.
Thanks,
Rahul
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Hello,
I want to design a new robot, which will be a nice one, but the question is how do you design a robot from scratch?
I am confused with it.
Thanks,
Rahul
For me, I look at what parts I want to use, and let the robot grow on these parts.
Easier than fitting everything in a pre-made armor-box.
look at videos or attend events to determine what you want to build. Sketch up a few designs and write up a list of parts. From here you can either cad up the design, build a mock up in cardboard our jump straight in (not advisable).
get your parts together and begin manufacture. Test it, break it, fix it repeat indefinitely
For Storm II, the reverse of Mario.....
- Define what you want your robot to do at the highest level possible (we started with the word 'win')
- Break that initial statement down into what you think is required to achieve that goal (for us words like maintainability, reliability, ease of access were all things we considered in being required to win, long before we thought about weapons - they are a secondary thing)
- Understand the hardware that you want to build your robot out of, research, research, research. Attend some live events (http://www.robotslive.co.uk and http://www.roamingrobots.co.uk or http://www.robochallenge.co.uk) before you buy anything as having attended you might find you want to go back to stage one again
- Then... and only then start working out what needs to go where, and let that drive the overall size of the robot. Just propping parts up against each other as you aquire them is a far way to go, and never underestimate CAD (Cardboard Aided Design).... or if you fancy teaching yourself, Computer Aided Design
Only after all that, will you start to have a feel for how big something will be. But my honest advice is don't start with a pre-concieved idea about what the robot will look like, work out what you want it to do.
I think the best possible thing you can do is come to the Robo challenge workshop weekend in december ( See live events page) you will be talked through all the parts what goes into making a robot and also see them fighting
I think the OP is posting from India.Quote:
Originally Posted by teamkenny
Thanks..
I like the idea of making CAD(Cardboard design :D). Do you have any Computerized CAD model of a simple robot which you made(if you let me see it).
I have Solidworks in my PC but I dont want to first waste a lot of time learning it and then start designing.
I used to have google sketchup which literally sucks. its very very basic and nothing good with it.
If you guys can show me your design please do.
Because this CAD design(which I gonna make) , I will hand over it to the laser cutting shop which will cut the plastic into this shape.
Also, teamstorm I like your robot's design. Its really really nice. Can I make something like yours?
imo after reading you have solidworks already this might be the perfect opportunity to learn the program.
so design a robot as the others have said then try and do so within solidworks, everyones first robot (typically) is kinda basic so it shouldn't be too difficult to input into solidworks.
plus when you want to upgrade parts or build a whole new robot you can use SW to produce part file etc which can then be machined or cut out professionally.
Definately learn the software, this is a skill you can take with you. Cardboard is a great tool for roughing out the basics though. Lego and meccano can also be really good tools.
How much is Solidworks or similar :?:
Either start with a trial version or an educational version if you can get hold of one.
Hmm. How much time will it take for a new comer to learn?
Though i master designing tools such as illustrator and photoshop.
It is impossible to answer how long it will take, as it would be like trying to answer how long is a piece of string?
It won't be hours, that is for sure. A few days might get you going and within a week or two I'd expect to be quite comfortable. That said, I have never worked with Solidworks. People like Eventorizon have, though, and he has been using the software for years. He appears to be able to create pretty much anything in the programme.
I wouldn't ignore Google Sketchup. It is very capable of helping with a first robot. I designed Tormenta 2 completely in Sketchup before building:
http://i1088.photobucket.com/albums/i32 ... 1341527432
http://i1088.photobucket.com/albums/i32 ... 1341527477
http://i1088.photobucket.com/albums/i32 ... 1341527422
As you can see the programme is capable of doing quite a lot. The final robot changed some from the CAD, but it helped hugely. Sketchup took me less than an hour to get used to.
It didn't take me very long to learn the basics of solidworks- only a couple of hours. And you can learn a lot through trial and error.
My advise is to just give it a go
I use Solidworks at work - did a 4 day course and only covered the basics. Saying that there is so much on it you barely use 10% of it. The main feature is the ability to construct a whole assembly from individual parts - you put a hole in the wrong place you cannot assemble it in the programme. You know before you make anything it will go together. Will also give you a volume measurement for each part, combined with a relative density, gives you the weight..........
Downside....through a dealer was quoted £3000.....a year.....
There are hookey versions available but never got one working properly on my pc
My pc at work has 6gb ram on the graphics card but still slows up on large assemblies.
Despite that I love it, there is nothing you cannot do with it.
Trev
I use AutoDesk Inventor - it works in a very similar way to Solidworks but I prefer some of the features and stress analysis/3D animations and genuine simulations.
Once you have the basic's of any CAD program, they all become fairly similar to use for basic things.
Here's my first play around with an animation in Inventor.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t9XPdtCImT4
And here's a genuine Simulation with 13kg steel block on the end of the flipper running at 20 bar :) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wtsXdHQt3_k John Reid did that one when we were working a few things out.
And some very useful stress analysis on the flipper arm. This shows where any weak points are when the full force of the ram is pushing on it. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-7pe3mT6tq4
3D Cad packages really are worth learning. It will add a huge amount to your CV and employability if your looking into anything engineering/design related.
Nice. Thanks
Learning sometimes seems boaring, like I started watching Java tutorials so that I could learn how to create awesome apps to interface with arduino, but after watching the 11th tutorial of the series- I feel like shifting to Visual C# language because java is boaring :(