Team Gas Diary's

[Gaseraki]

Hey guys
Thought I would post a some what build report / blog on my builds. Decided to go back into this weird hobby as frankly I missed it heeps. Since my last involvement with robots I have mostly been building arcade cabinets and a handheld netbook mame emulator
Things have changed and I now live in a studio apartment in Wimbledon, London. I have a balcony but next to no space. So lacking my larger tools and room to make a mess.
So my diary could be helpful for those in similar positions.


My mentality on robot projects is also going to change. Rather than 'try and build for this event' I am going to take my time. It will be ready when its ready. My past robots have really suffered from rushing and not proper planning.

[Gaseraki]

I designed the robot in maya which isn't recommended. Its what I use on a day to day basis and didn't want to learn new software. I wanted the robot to have quite a lot of parts to snap together. Advantages is if a part gets damaged I can just print a new piece and cut it out.

Main chassis is 6mm nylon, backed up with 8mm HDPE and the armor is undecided but Ti or ali is being considered mostly on weight
47 different robot parts of Nylon
42 pieces of HDPE
After I was happy with the design I imported it into illustrator and printed it all out. Initially I tried to print a giant tiled a4 sheets to create 50 by 100cm. After trying to attach the 7th sheet and not happy with the accuracy I had more sense and printed out as many parts that i could fit on a4 sheets and layed them out accordingly. Only the bulkheads needed more then a4 and was an easy task of lining up the prints.

[Gaseraki]

Cutting wise There were a few tools which were essential
router for the long straight lines and the bevels on the bulkheads. FIrst time using this and made sure I had lots of practice before working on the nylon. Used G clamps, very large spirit level ruler and took my time
Rage mitre saw which is more accurate and used as much as possible and can cut up to 220 mm
Jigsaw which was for the more unacurate cuts but was used occasionally on the small parts
Dremel Surprisingly very efficient toll in helping the chassis slot in together
Piller drill for the holes

The nylon was tricky to cut at times. It got caught on the mitire saw occasional and I had to do very slow cutting on it. Melted a lot when cut with a jigsaw.
HDPE is awesome to work with. Very soft, like butter in most tools. Was perfect for bridging parts of the chassis together.

Assembly was straight forward. Surprisingly time consuming. but most is being held by m3 bolts and 3mm screws. Robot looks very ikea. So many parts. Surprisingly everything is very accurate. Really impressed with my handy work. Measurements are only off by 1mm here and there but still very much in range of my CADbulkheads wip2.jpgFirst parts assembled.jpgassembly 1 motor temp fitting.jpgassembly 2 front view.jpgassembly 3 back view.jpgBulkheads wip 1.jpg

[harry hills]

Very nicely done, looking brilliant

[SamO]

Sorry, I didn't mean to thank your post, my iPods touch screen is a bit glitchy!

You robot is looking excellent though !

[Gaseraki]

Thanks Guys! I was a bit baffeled about the like Sam as I didnt do anything ^_^
Really trying to do my best with this build. As little bodging as possible

Lazy day at work and I found a video of Trojan II

Be warned, Dave is very rude at the end :P

[PJ-27]

How did you cut everything so straight and square?!

When I tried to cut my HDPE bulkheads by hand they were about as square and a curly wurly!

[Gaseraki]

Howdy PJ
The bulkheads are Nylon and I cut them with a router and a large spirit level ruler (picture related)
Professional-Spirit-Level_large.jpg
Placed the ruler about 5cm away from the cut (way my router is setup)
Secured very tightly with heavy duty G clamps (bit of scrap wood to not damage the ruler and the bench)
Push firm and cut with the router.

Happy with the results but as expect few MM off here and there without CNC cutting. So I bolted the bulkheads together and filed them down till they were all quite identicle
Hope that helps

#edit
Sorry you quite clearly said everything rather then just the bulkheads
Big thanks to loads of the straight cuts to my sliding mitre saw. Made life a lot easier and it has a large slide function. But as I said nylon is very scary to cut on it. Have to cut very slowly or it catches rather then cuts.

[PJ-27]

Good idea, I tried something similar with a Jigsaw, but didn't work out, Router might work better! Cheers!

[razerdave]

Good to see you back in the game Marco

Apologies for that video

[Gaseraki]

Cheers Dave and haven't quite entered the game
Been terrible and have parts for 2 ants and probably 2 feathers

[daveimi]

Wow are they LEM's / Etek's in a feather!! Or scooter motors etc?

[Gaseraki]

300 watt scooter motors which are planned to be overvolted and run by a wotty
Yep silly, I know.
Upgrade goals are to bring the voltage from 24 to close to 30 with liths and replace the wotty with a sidewinder for space
I did try to run it on an scorpion XXL but it blew before it even reached the arena.
This version will also be much quicker at over 15mph

[Gaseraki]

Sadly as I expected I havnt been able to spend much time in the past couple of days working on Trojan but I have made a few important decisions.

For the drive in Trojan 2 I had about 3.5 gear reduction with one sprocket system going from the motor to the two wheels.

To make things more reliable I have decided to go for two separate systems. First reduction through spur gears to the front wheels then 6mm chain and sprockets to the rear wheels.
Already done some work towards this by constructing one of the wheels and nearly hacksawed all the sprockets. Lots of arm work needed!

After watching some past videos I realise that having the biggest motors in the world wont mean jack if you dont have grip to take advantage of the torque. I have more grip but I still will be wheel spinning constantly. So I decided to get more speed and changed the reduction from 3.5 to 2.
This will make the robots max speed of 20mph! But should still have the torque to push other robots quite easily. Should be entertaining!
So just ordered some sprockets and now doing 2 chain systems. If things are a bit crazy I can just go to the
sprockets and the 3.5 reduction.

2013-05-31 08.40.42.jpg
Also thinking about the lifting prongs at the front and it might be tricky. But I think a worm gear reduction from a drill motor will have good results. Needs to be an afterthought as I need to work out what weight i have.


Also had a quick sketch up in 3d of the next feather. Bit more impressive looking but probably won't be as good.
carnifex.jpgfex.jpg
This weekend will be set on finishing the chassis and all the tiny little plates that attach around the wheels.

Wow I might even look good to possibly make Guildford but personal promises need to hold up. I am not going to rush.


Few questions
Is 6mm chain fine? I used to have ⅜ and that was far too big

Suitable featherweight armour nowadays. Ali, ti or steel. Would 2mm steel be a deathwish on the front plate? I had 3mm ali plate on the top for a long while and seemed fine against little hitter. Last time I fought a featherweight spinner was back in 2003 so my experience with them is limited
Lastly how do I set my avatar to appear in my posts?

[PJ-27]

Go top right - settings
Left bottom side - My profile
Edit Avatar

Your profile picture and avatar are 2 different things. The avatar is the one that appears on the forum itself next to your posts.

For image re-sizing I use this. Quick and easy:
http://www.shrinkpictures.com/