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After Cicatrix performing pretty badly at the UK Champs I thought a build diary to explain myself would be good 
. Also already got a number of upgrades in the pipeline that will hopefully be up and running for RL Edinburgh.
First of all, before the champs. Jamie (k_c_r) and I were putting the electrics in the robot the sunday before the championships and realised the extent of the problem we had. Using 2 electronize ESCs for the back wheels and a scorpion XL for the front wheels was proving a bit of a challenge, we could either have the wheels accelerating at different speeds or 3 wheel drive where alternate back wheels worked depending on whether the robot was going forward or turning. After looking for answers on how to fix it for the next few days we worked out we needed an external mixer which would be fitted on the day of the championships. Also, my charger decided not to work for a few days (will test it later to see if it works with NiMH now, seems to work with Li-po's) which meant I couldn't do any testing after the batteries started to die on the sunday evening. Also having to help with my cousins build stopped me doing much more to it.
Got to the championships, realised I had wired up the deans on the batteries stupidly and had to rewire them to work with Jamies chargers he kindly lent me, so that took up a lot of time. Then, realised that only the scorpion XL was working properly minutes before the first fight so quickly disconnected the electronizes and went into the fight.
First fight, Jamie had told me that his salvaged turbine plate strapped to the front was too low and I hadn't sorted that out so got beached almost right away. Fortunately, my cousins driving was so poor he drove into the pit right away and I still got 2 points for not really moving. 2 points was the most I was expecting anyway really against Buzzbar, came out with nothing too serious damaged anyway, just the odd battle scar.
Second fight, everything was working, front scoop had been ground down and the rear wheels were back in action including the addition of a v-tail mixer giving me 4WD. Was a bit tight again to get the robot ready for this fight, maybe leaving a minute or so to spare. Into the arena working and drove full tilt into Tiny Toon, with Tiny Toon doing the same to me, somehow the BEC attached itself to a live wire from the battery and burnt out, which caused the receiver to power down. Again luckily for me Tiny Toon got flipped out before the fight was stopped for me fire and I got 2 points again.
At some point, I cant remember if it was after fight 1 or 2, pretty sure it was now, one of the electronizes decided it would only do full forward or full reverse, changing direction randomly between the 2. After stealing some more of Jamies equipment I replaced the electronize and also attached its BEC and lopped off the burnt out BEC wires from my electronize. Fortunately the rest of the ESC had still survived despite its slight fire. For a change I had looooads of time between fights 2 and 3 and didn't even need to charge the batteries, after only actually moving for about 2 seconds in each of the last 2 fights.
Third fight, was impressed by the pushing power where it seems to have the edge over the robot dubbed Ringpiece which was a relatively late replacement by Team Shock. Had Beauty 2 fairly close to flipping itself OOTA when it self righted (I thought) but I suppose i'll see the video when its youtubed to get a better view of it. But anyway, B2 managed to self right and flipped me OOTA so just the 1 point for me there and that was the end of my championships with just 5 points.
Great experience though
and as I said before, a few upgrades planned. This post is getting a bit long though so will post a list of upgrades a bit later.
Finally, have to say a big thanks to all the teams present, especially the ones who helped us out with problems and gave us advise over the weekend.
. Also already got a number of upgrades in the pipeline that will hopefully be up and running for RL Edinburgh.First of all, before the champs. Jamie (k_c_r) and I were putting the electrics in the robot the sunday before the championships and realised the extent of the problem we had. Using 2 electronize ESCs for the back wheels and a scorpion XL for the front wheels was proving a bit of a challenge, we could either have the wheels accelerating at different speeds or 3 wheel drive where alternate back wheels worked depending on whether the robot was going forward or turning. After looking for answers on how to fix it for the next few days we worked out we needed an external mixer which would be fitted on the day of the championships. Also, my charger decided not to work for a few days (will test it later to see if it works with NiMH now, seems to work with Li-po's) which meant I couldn't do any testing after the batteries started to die on the sunday evening. Also having to help with my cousins build stopped me doing much more to it.
Got to the championships, realised I had wired up the deans on the batteries stupidly and had to rewire them to work with Jamies chargers he kindly lent me, so that took up a lot of time. Then, realised that only the scorpion XL was working properly minutes before the first fight so quickly disconnected the electronizes and went into the fight.
First fight, Jamie had told me that his salvaged turbine plate strapped to the front was too low and I hadn't sorted that out so got beached almost right away. Fortunately, my cousins driving was so poor he drove into the pit right away and I still got 2 points for not really moving. 2 points was the most I was expecting anyway really against Buzzbar, came out with nothing too serious damaged anyway, just the odd battle scar.
Second fight, everything was working, front scoop had been ground down and the rear wheels were back in action including the addition of a v-tail mixer giving me 4WD. Was a bit tight again to get the robot ready for this fight, maybe leaving a minute or so to spare. Into the arena working and drove full tilt into Tiny Toon, with Tiny Toon doing the same to me, somehow the BEC attached itself to a live wire from the battery and burnt out, which caused the receiver to power down. Again luckily for me Tiny Toon got flipped out before the fight was stopped for me fire and I got 2 points again.
At some point, I cant remember if it was after fight 1 or 2, pretty sure it was now, one of the electronizes decided it would only do full forward or full reverse, changing direction randomly between the 2. After stealing some more of Jamies equipment I replaced the electronize and also attached its BEC and lopped off the burnt out BEC wires from my electronize. Fortunately the rest of the ESC had still survived despite its slight fire. For a change I had looooads of time between fights 2 and 3 and didn't even need to charge the batteries, after only actually moving for about 2 seconds in each of the last 2 fights.
Third fight, was impressed by the pushing power where it seems to have the edge over the robot dubbed Ringpiece which was a relatively late replacement by Team Shock. Had Beauty 2 fairly close to flipping itself OOTA when it self righted (I thought) but I suppose i'll see the video when its youtubed to get a better view of it. But anyway, B2 managed to self right and flipped me OOTA so just the 1 point for me there and that was the end of my championships with just 5 points.
Great experience though
and as I said before, a few upgrades planned. This post is getting a bit long though so will post a list of upgrades a bit later.Finally, have to say a big thanks to all the teams present, especially the ones who helped us out with problems and gave us advise over the weekend.
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