How Could I Improve...

[paulc]

Just ell me what right/wrong. I wont start moaning - I dont want a repeat of THAT .

Paul, just for reference:

Hannibalito III
(L)35cm x (W)45cm x (H)20cm

That is a real Featherweight not a vapour one.

You come up with a heavyweight vapour of 50x50x26, and you want to shove more motorpower in there than a Fiat 500, a pnumatic weapon, and the bottle(s) to feed them.

That is not realistic.

[kodster]

Leo has hit the gold with that one.

Paul, take our vapourbots dimensions, for example. They would tower over yours. No offense, but you really need to make them bigger.

[bobblebot2]

Paul, this isnt a criticism of your stats but I thought Id say - if you didnt write them all in capitals they would be a lot easier to read

--
Mike
http://www.bobblebot.co.ukhttp://www.bobblebot.co.uk *New*

[andrewj]

Your stats seem like a reasonable attempt, Paul, so I€™ll have a look€¦

Autoism

Armour on the front, rear and top, but what about the base! Also weight-reducing holes are very handy for spinners to latch on to and rip apart. Also, as others have mentioned, your dimensions should be almost twice as large.

I don€™t quite understand the weapon€¦ you started by saying it was like Big Nipper, then went on to say it€™s a scoop, then went on to saying it was claws. Are the pliers horizontal or vertical? And what do the lifting mechanism and pliers run on? You said a Razer style system but you need to give some more specifics.

5mm ground clearance is pretty low, especially as you have sprung skirts. If you have sprung skirts, up the ground clearance as there is less chance of flippers getting under. Having them sprung also means slightly less manoeuvrability and therefore you will want more clearance.

Knocking-Out

Unless you are intending to make a serious rammer, I don€™t advise using Etek€™s as they take up plenty of weight. I think you just want some standard motors for this thing such as S28-400€™s. Again the dimensions need to be larger. There are a few things that need to be fixed with your weapon - what mechanism does it run on? Also there is no such thing as a 1000psi bore ram. The bore is the diameter of the ram you are using, which you stated as 80mm. What is the stroke (length) of the ram? What gas are you using? How much of this is on board?

Your skirts will be pretty heavy at 8mm thick Hardox. You might want to tone this down slightly. Also why are the skirts bolted on, and where did you find these Hardox bolts?

You also haven€™t give details of batteries in either of the stats. I know a lot of people don€™t include them but they are useful to know. Mike also has a point, the capitals are a bit off-putting. But a good start!

AJ, I gotta take my hat off to you. Very good post, and covered everything that Ive been trying to post for 3 days without swearing

Just to add a bit more to it, I think the biggest issue you have here Paul is that your aiming to high with your designs, your trying to fit the best of everything into a design, without fully understanding each aspect.

You need to occasionally step back and say Hey, why havent I see a real robot with Etek drive, a massive pneumatic hammer and hardox armour? The reason why? Because it cannot be done within the weight limit.

Since youve asked for honest help, Ive draft a set of stats for Knocking Out for you, a set that I believe will easily make it into the weight limit and is still a reasonably competitive design.

Name: Knocking Out
Size (LxWxH): 600 x 600 x 300
Weight: 100KG
Speed: 15MPH
GC: 0mm at the skirts, 10mm under the robot
Drive: 2 x S28-400 Magmotors @ 24v, geared 8:1 onto 4 urethane (Volcalon) coated wheels in a 4WD configuration.
Weapon: The weapon is a Terrorhurtz style axe with a 270 degree swing, via a rack and pinion mechanism. The system uses a 80mm bore, 100mm stroke ram with a working pressure of 250psi (17 BAR), creating 860KG of force @ the ram, the system also has a 2L buffer tank to ensure a fast hammering action. The system is supplied by a 2KG CO2 tank capable of 45 shots @ 250PSI with the remainder shots at reducing pressure.
Chassis/Armour: 4mm Hardox front, sides and back, 4mm titanium top and base plate.
Batteries: 3 x 24v 3600Mah NiCD pack (20 cell packs) producing 24v @ 10.8Amp/Hours
Special Notes: Selfrights via weapon. Shaped like Beta (truncated pyramid). 4 x 3.2mm Hardox 450 skirts which are held on via a bolted rubber hinge.

Id have to CAD it to check that it is 100% in the weight limit, but just making some assumptions of weights it looks fairly close.

[paulc]

Can you check if my adjusted version of Autoism is alright, and if not just say.

AUTOISM

€ WEIGHT: 100KG

€ ARMOUR: 5MM MONOCUQUE HARDOX ON FRONT REAR AND TOP. 4MM ALUMINIUM BORON CARBIDE FOR THE SIDES AND BASE. WEIGHT REDUCING HOLES ARE DRILLED INTO THE MONOCQUE CHASSIS TO REDUCE WEIGHT.

€ SHAPE: BOX WITH POINTED (TRIANGULAR) SIDES AND REAR TO LOWER SPINNER EFFECTIVENESS

€ MOTORS: 2 x LEM 130 AT 46V = 18HP

€ LOCOMOTION: 4 x VULKALON TREADED WHEELS ON TOP AND BOTTOM ALA BIG NIPPER. EACH IS

€ DIMENSIONS: (L) 80CM (W) 80CM (H) 25CM

€ COLOUR: BLACK FOR THE BODY, SILVER FOR THE CRUSHING WEAPON AND SCOOP COMBO. NOW, ON TOP, IT HAS THE NAME €˜AUTOISM€™ WRITTEN IN SLIVER

€ WEAPONRY: THE WEAPON FOR THIS IS STILL A BIG NIPPER STYLE CRUSHING/LIFTING ARM, BUT INSTEAD OF CLAWS TO LIFT WITH, IT HAS A SCOOP WITH AN EXTENSION. THE RAZER STYLE CRUSHER HAS BEEN REMOVED AND REPLACED WITH A PAIR OF 3.25MM HARDOX PLIARS, WORKING ON THE SYSTEM AS THE LIFTER AS THE PLIARS ARE PART OF THE LIFTER TO AVOID BEING TORN OUT BY SPINNERS. THE WEAPONS LIFTS AND CRUSHES WITH A FORCE OF 9 TONNES, USING A RAZER-LIKE MECHANISM FOR LIFTING AND CRUSHING! THE NEW CRUSHING WEAPON MEANS THAT IF FLIPPED, THE ROBOT DOESN€™T NEED TO SELF-RIGHT

€ SPEED: 23MPH

€ GROUND CLEARANCE: 0MM - 15MM. 4MM HARDOX SPRUNG SKIRTS ON THE SIDES AND REAR MAKE IT A NIGHTMARE TO GET UNDER.

€ STRENGTH: POWER, SPEED AND WEAPONS MAKE IT A TOUGH MACHINE

€ WEAKNESS: WEAK SIDE ARMOUR

Now THATS better, but theres still one thing wrong with it: its not going to be able to crush with a force of 9 tonnes.

Other than that, it looks competition-ready.

[alex_holt]

As a matter of interest, what was Razers supposed tonnage?

[paulc]

Razers supposed tonage was 9 tonnes at the rear of the pincer, as it works like a set of pliars but reversed. Its the same with me - at the front, its 9 tonnes and at the rear its 3 tonnes.

Only, Ive decided to lower the crushing force to 6 tonnes.