Team Invade's Build Diary

[Mouldy]

Re: Team Invade's Build Diary

This looks really good guys. It entered into the champs?

[Team Invade]

Re: Team Invade's Build Diary

Thanks for the comments It'll just be for whiteboards for this year, we've chosen to enter Explosion on the basis that it's the 2nd seed and this is completely untested, and may not be finished properly in time. Wouldn't mind putting it in the Annihilator though if it's offered a place.

[Eventorizon]

Re: Team Invade's Build Diary

Is that the same disc as Inertia XL? I heard that some one accidentally ordered like 10 when he actually wanted just 1.

[Team Invade]

Re: Team Invade's Build Diary

Yes the disc is the same as the one on Inertia. The story I heard was that 2 were wanted (one spare), but accidentally double clicked 2 to make 22. Though I assume whoever it was came back and stopped the machine before the full 22 were made. Not too sure how accurate that story is!

As far as I know, there's one on Inertia, Toonimator, and Mario had two (one of which he sold to us, one I believe he intends to use on his own robot). As far as I know, this was the last one available so that would make four in total.

[grant_ploughbot]

Re: Team Invade's Build Diary

There's alot more than 4 of them around! They are very good though. Hornet used to cause some good carnage with one!

[Team Invade]

Re: Team Invade's Build Diary

They are very good discs. 8mm Hardox 650 seems more than tough enough for the job

There probably are more than four of them around, they were the only four I could think of. I never knew that Hornet used one of them, but it certainly got some big impacts with it!

[typhoon_driver]

Re: Team Invade's Build Diary

Hornet 2 never used one of the hardox 650 discs. I got hornet 2s discs custom made by JL steel services from hardox 500. Got two plasma cut and sold one to Ed which Dave buggered up with 360 a while back.

The second one I cut a tooth off and rebalanced. From memory they were 12mm thick and I designed them to have the majority of the weight at the end. That was why hornet 2 was sold deadly. Well that and the magmotor!

I'll need to get around to rebuilding hornet 2 at some point. Brushless plus lipo would make that a fun machine!

[Mega Masher]

Re: Team Invade's Build Diary

Just out of interest, what material and what thickness is explosion's armour (it was enough to hold off NST and 360)?

[Revsmin]

Re: Team Invade's Build Diary

It's 4-6mm HDPE mounted on a Hardox frame.

[Mega Masher]

Re: Team Invade's Build Diary

Thanks for that MicroGravity100.

[psychostorm]

Re: Team Invade's Build Diary

(it was enough to hold off NST and 360)

Ah, no.

Jarvis, Photobucket hates my mobile. LOL.

[Revsmin]

Re: Team Invade's Build Diary

There's no picture there Ceri

[Team Invade]

Re: Team Invade's Build Diary

The main structural armour on Explosion is the Hardox. That's what holds off the spinners and makes it reliable. The purpose of the HDPE is only to cover the gaps in the frame and to absorb impacts, which is why relatively thin thicknesses are sufficient. Also half the reason the HDPE is so tough is the amount of screws holding the panels on. The entire base and flipper arm is made out of Hardox, it needs to be to stop it from tearing itself apart!

Also Ceri it was enough to hold off NST. The damage caused by NST was entirely superficial, and the only reason it stopped in the final was because the link came out. The actual 'insides' of the robot were unharmed, the robot could have gone in a whiteboard if we'd wanted to! So in that sense the armour was tough enough. Although the robot came out looking a lot worse for wear, the armour would have still held up even in that condition.

More info can be found here: http://teaminvade.co.uk/index_files/Page535.htm

Hope that helps

[psychostorm]

Re: Team Invade's Build Diary

The point I was inferring was that the the 4-6mm HDPE armour wasn't NST proof & I would never recommend anyone else try to copy it.

I consider Explosion's strengths not to be the armour (I've never counted structure as armour BTW) but the strong build, the excellent design & superb driving.

These strengths are why it survived NST, not the plastic or hardox frame. You quite literally couldn't duplicate Explosion.

[Team Invade]

Re: Team Invade's Build Diary

Completely agree 4-6mm HDPE on its own isn't anywhere near enough. But is does help the Hardox by absorbing the impacts. What you've got to remember is that the frame is only about 10mm wide, so the HDPE is quite crucial. I think that the HDPE gives a lot more strength than it looks like.

But I'd say without a frame you need at least HDPE 10mm thick.

I'm also inclined to agree about the excellent design and superb driving comments