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Thread: Team Kaizen Build Diary

  1. #311
    Ouch ! 6 out of 6 losses Lucy after all that preparation I dot blame you for been upset, of course

    winning is not everything, well it is for some but generally it's not always achieved.

    My view is as long as you entertained at a big event you are still a winner and I guess your Robot

    been grabbed by a house Robot and put through the Mangler did the trick and I'm sure there were

    a few more highs when you look back.

    Why not try getting to a few smaller events so iron out the creases and find out what works and what

    doesn't ?.

  2. #312
    Ocracoke's Avatar
    Team Kaizen

    It wasn't the fact that I didn't win, it was more a case of the robots underperforming. I have no problem (usually :P) with losing if the fight is good. For example, Extreme Robots Cheltenham 2019 was a glorious event for me despite the MW failing because of a battery wire failure because finally, after a year of that iteration of the MW failing because of stupid things like axe shafts twisting et al, it finally worked and presented at least a credible opposition in the arena. As you say though, I do look back at the event with the first fight with a smile because it just seems to be a thing for me to have my robot destroyed at a Robots Live event. As I put it to Greg, "at least I bring entertainment value."

    Why not try getting to a few smaller events so iron out the creases and find out what works and what doesn't?
    The issue is for me is that there are no "small" MW or FW events I can easily attend. RoboDojo is on the other side of the country so even going to that is a whole day excursion and when I am committed to being elsewhere on a Sunday or a Saturday I just can't go. I don't have a driveway or even a relatively suitable garden to trial these with properly and obviously, testing in a public space (with the MW especially) is a big no-no.

    I may end up building a testing arena for these for use at BotFest events and othes because this lack of testing is getting to be a real pain.
    Team Kaizen - Build Diary for all the robots

    AW: Amai, Ikari, Lafiel, Osu, Ramu
    BW: Shu!, The Honey Badger
    FW: Azriel
    MW: Jibril, Kaizen

  3. #313
    Team Helix
    Guest
    Hi lucy, don't be down harted. You were super unlucky i kept trying to get you back over but as hard as i tied you always seem to end up upside down. Sorry.

  4. #314
    Ocracoke's Avatar
    Team Kaizen

    No worries Tom, I know you tried and thanks for that. One day, I will get Jibril working properly and we'll have to have a grudge match

    Speaking of, I am going to order some sheets of Nylon and some more U-bolts and rebuild the axe carrier with the motor supported properly. The change in gearing means the carrier needs to be rebuilt anyway so hopefully the change means it'll look less ungainly. I'll make some plates for the drive gears as well so they'll mesh properly.
    Team Kaizen - Build Diary for all the robots

    AW: Amai, Ikari, Lafiel, Osu, Ramu
    BW: Shu!, The Honey Badger
    FW: Azriel
    MW: Jibril, Kaizen

  5. #315
    Team Helix
    Guest
    Just make sure you keep the shafts of the gears solid/ fixed and you should have no issues

  6. #316
    Ocracoke's Avatar
    Team Kaizen

    The gears in the carrier themselves are fine, it is the actual axe motor gear that is slipping. I think what has happened is when I drilled the holes for the motor face bolts I drilled too big a hole because I couldn't line them up on the HDPE sheet (I was lacking a pillar drill at the time, which I now have).

    The quick and dirty solution is to slide in a bit of 2mm HDPE underneath the motor to raise the front of the motor up to mesh properly. Longer term is to rebuild the carrier entirely as described.

    The drive motors, I think either the motor or the wheel itself is out of position. I suspect the latter but will measure.
    Team Kaizen - Build Diary for all the robots

    AW: Amai, Ikari, Lafiel, Osu, Ramu
    BW: Shu!, The Honey Badger
    FW: Azriel
    MW: Jibril, Kaizen

  7. #317
    McMullet
    Guest
    Sounds like a frustrating day out Lucy, glad you still have a plan and the enthusiasm to iron out those last few mechanical issues!

  8. #318
    Ocracoke's Avatar
    Team Kaizen

    Don't get me wrong, I was grateful for having been to an event at all, the robots just underperformed. If I can get the time, I'll try to go to Dojo with both to get them properly tested. That being said, we are planning to move house fairly soon here to somewhere with a proper shed area so I don't have to haul these things up and down the stairs.
    Team Kaizen - Build Diary for all the robots

    AW: Amai, Ikari, Lafiel, Osu, Ramu
    BW: Shu!, The Honey Badger
    FW: Azriel
    MW: Jibril, Kaizen

  9. #319
    Ocracoke's Avatar
    Team Kaizen

    As is customary for this thread, here is the review of Team Kaizen's performance in 2021.

    Ramu/Osu/Ikari/Amai
    The ants, accompanied by a new robot from a first time roboteer called Ghosty, did reasonably well considering the competition at BotFest 4. For 2022, I'll be retiring Amai 1.1 and building a replacement robot which interestingly enough my Dad suggested the design for when he came to BotFest 3. Ikari will also be rebuilt to version 3.1 to address some of the issues in the 3.0 version.

    The Honey Badger

    The experience at Rampage in Chatham was a brusing encounter but fun nonetheless. The drive motors in particular are completely knackered and need replacing along with the body which I am not happy with overall. I'll be looking to make the 4.2 version more compact and with stronger/faster motors and better protection around the wheels as a whole. The flipping arm mechanism though I am really pleased with and may carry that forwards to other robots.

    Azriel
    I must confess I wasn't happy with Azriel's performance at Robots Live! in Crawley. The axe worked well enough sure but there were/are a lot of build issues that often meant an early retirement from the melee matches and wouldn't stand up in a competition match. I had originally been planning to completely rebuild Azriel into a 2.0 version but I am instead going to concentrate on the electrics for a 1.1 version (which is where the majority of the problems are) and tidy the whole wiring loom up so that it'll be less likely to shutdown during a fight.

    Jibril
    Like Azriel, Jibril didn't perform as well as I would have hoped in Crawley. It moved OK but the gears in the drive need replacing and the axe needs retiming to ~25:1 with proper independent mounts. The armour held up fine but one of the side arms became bent from being flipped and landing awkwardly. If being totally honest, I think the main issue with Jibril is the baseplate where it isn't stiff enough. I will see if I can add in a brace for the 2.1 version.

    So with that all out of the way, I won't be able to work on the robots until I've moved house as practically all my machining gear and robots themselves are in storage at the moment. This also means that I can't work on the BotFest arena until the whole process is done and that could be a long, long while (as in late spring time) but the process will be worth it as we are looking to move to somewhere with a garage and a extra special something. I am hoping to find the time to edit the BotFest 4 video this week to finally have that released.
    Team Kaizen - Build Diary for all the robots

    AW: Amai, Ikari, Lafiel, Osu, Ramu
    BW: Shu!, The Honey Badger
    FW: Azriel
    MW: Jibril, Kaizen

  10. #320
    Ocracoke's Avatar
    Team Kaizen

    So moving house... yeah. That has pretty much stalled and has left me bereft of most of my tools and equipment for building robots as they are in storage, as is Azriel and Jibril. So big brain move, let's rebuild The Honey Badger! In all seriousness, it needed it after Chatham and dammit, I want to go back to roboteering.

    The Honey Badger
    If you recall, The Honey Badger 4.1 was at Rampage in Chatham and it did... urm... about as well as you might expect against some really top notch competition. It left the event with broken motors and a really chewed up rear end. Since then, I've not touched it for various life related reasons.

    Anyway, cut to this week and with one week left to go until the deadline to prove it was mobile, I found the motiviation to go and do it. I was wavering on wherever or not I was going to drop out but eh, better to try and break it than to never build it in the first place.

    This time, I decided to use a set of new ESCs and Motors from BBB since I get the feeling that it is more in line with what people in the BW scene are using in terms of a brushed setup. However, I did fluff up and didn't get the right sized screws so will need to repurpose some copper pipe clips for motor clamps. Not a big job in of itself. I also had to try and head the HDPE to straighten out the damage. Lacking in a heat gun, I ended up using the hob in the kitchen and my hand wrapped in a towel to bend it back straight. Kids, do NOT do this. I am a idiot so learn from my mistakes.

    Anyway, the robot is now disassembled in the lounge with the new electronics soldered in. For the 4.1.1 version, I'll be replacing the wheel guards with solid ones because the hinged ones were terrible and will also be adding some Nylon studs to the back so it cannot get beached on its back again but otherwise will look broadly the same. I'll also glue the tyres to the wheels properly so they don't come off. I would have liked to change the wheels entirely but sadly no.

    Also, that front sheet of thin HDPE is gone. It made the robot look quite unwieldy and it was a last minute hack which didn't work.

    So here it is, very much a work in progress! I hope to have it running tomorrow night.
    20220207_231809.jpg
    Team Kaizen - Build Diary for all the robots

    AW: Amai, Ikari, Lafiel, Osu, Ramu
    BW: Shu!, The Honey Badger
    FW: Azriel
    MW: Jibril, Kaizen

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