Help with choosing parts for a first robot, please.

[dotDominic]

IT WORKS! VENATOR ACTUALLY WORKS!! THERE'S AN ACTUAL FIGHTING ROBOT DRIVING AROUND IN MY BACK GARDEN HOW COOL IS THIS



I'm so delighted with the result: Started with no experience in this sort of thing and a couple of rusty old tools. 18 months later I've gained a basic idea of Electronics, D.I.Y. and CAD Modelling, as well as a real fighting robot!!! Obviously I still have lots to learn but I have really enjoyed the build process. Just got to put on the steel wedges and it's good to go!

So a massive thank you to everyone who has posted on this thread and helped me out over the past year and a half! Considering the number of mistakes I've made, I would've never been able to do this without your advice.

Now I can actually fighting this thing! Will probably get smashed to bits but can't wait!

(Also, at the moment my DX6i has mapped the controls on a sort of diagonal, if that makes sense. So forward is top right and back is bottom left. Any idea how I can fix this? Thanks.)

[RogueTwoRobots]

IT WORKS! VENATOR ACTUALLY WORKS!! THERE'S AN ACTUAL FIGHTING ROBOT DRIVING AROUND IN MY BACK GARDEN HOW COOL IS THIS

(Also, at the moment my DX6i has mapped the controls on a sort of diagonal, if that makes sense. So forward is top right and back is bottom left. Any idea how I can fix this? Thanks.)

Congrats, glad to see the wiring mix-up didn't damage the ESCs and you've managed to get it working
The next toughest stage of robotics is learning how to drive and video it at the same time while being able to keep the camera pointed at the robot :P

With regards to the transmitter controls, it sounds like there isn't any form of mixing currently set up on it, so one channel is linked to one side of drive, and the second channel to the other (so fwd/back will move one side of the robot only). I'm not well versed in the menu options of the DX6i as I use Futaba transmitters, but if you look for a mixing menu, there should be an option for Elevon mixing, which should give proper joystick control with forward/back/left/right all matching with the stick movements.

You may find, when you turn mixing on, that moving the stick forward and back makes the robot turn left and right (and vice versa with the left/right stick). All you need to do is either swap round the ESC plugs in the receiver, reverse one or both channels, or swap terminals round on the motor connections. Just a case of trial and error with this; do one option at a time and see if it achieves the desired result, then keep going until you've got it all set up correctly.

Hope that doesn't sound too much like gibberish :P