Hello and thank you for accepting me into your illustrious organisation. I wish to get into roboteering and have decided to start with a featherweight. I have seen on the various threads already that cordless drill motors seem to be recommended. Are they any particular types/voltages/amps/other specs that I should look out for?
Most newcomers go for Argos drill motors for a first Feather as they're cheap and come with all metal gearboxes, they're 12v motors but you can overvolt them to 18v although this will shorten the life of them.
Thanks Sam. I will look into them
Can recommend Homebase's current cheap 12v drill offering (the "Powerbase" I believe) - nicely made, all metal drivetrain and a preferable motor pinion attachment method.
Best of luck with your build.
+1 for the powerbase. Nicer overall than argos or similar.
12v drills are a great drivetrain for a first robot, I wouldn't so much recommend overvolting them just because it can cause them to break quicker (especially if they don't have all metal gears) however you can get a bit more power out of them with that.
If you wanted to get fancier and a little easier to mount in a machine assuming you have a larger budget (Drill motors need modification, there's a few guides out there) there are ready to run gearboxes out there with easier mounting points etc, Gimsons used to offer the GR01/02 range but have since been discontinued though you may find a pair for sale on the forum from time to time. I'm led to believe both Shockbots and Ranglebox are going to be offering gearmotors in that sort of light too
There's a number of speed control options available for those too, the Botbitz TZ85s are pretty commonplace these days in machines, handle pretty much every motor you could throw at them on a featherweight scale.
Thank you for all your advice
This might seem like a silly question but would I need 1 or 2 motors for the drive?
2, one for the left and 1 for the right
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