Featherweight Discs

[ewan]

I have looked through many kinetic energy convertions and have come to the conclusion that speed (of the weapon) is the key to a sucessful featherweight spinner, as featherweights cannot spend to much of their weight, on a disc of much mass. What are the conditions of the possible 1500rpm spinner rule, as this would effect the weapon power of a featherweight spinner ALOT.
I have been pondering over many designs of featherweight, and a high speed disc seems the key to a successsful weapon, without buying a mag or anything . Please comment-

[robjones]

Featherweight Discs

A very cheap option Ewan might be to look at the deal Argos are doing right now. Its an 18v portable hand held circular saw, and a battery drill thrown in for £29.99 (made by Challenge). In the saw youll have the motor and fittings for your own disk weapon. Its 3200rpm at 18v.
I bought two for £60. I get two 18v drill motors, two nicad packs, two chargers, one ready built disk weapon and a saw to keep for building it!!

[craig_anto]

Featherweight Discs

BMW fan motors 12v 600w
on 24v they do 2400W thats near as damn it 3hp
there made by a sub contractor for wait for it

Lynch

[glen]

Featherweight Discs

could you provide any more information on that fan motor craigh regarding performance and weight. also what is the shaft type and size?

i think ill have to look at one for a spinner. most fan motors ive found are 240w at 12v.

@ewan. yes you will get more power by making the spinner faster. BUT it will be more unstable and it will have a slower spin up. hence why most people have a good balance between the two.

[ewan]

Featherweight Discs

Thankyou for your ideas. I had a look into the cordless circular saw, but instead I decided a more powerful 24v motor of sorts would do the job. If I could have some more information about that fan, then that would be great.
Im aiming for an 6-10 second spin-up time on a vertical spinner (so that you can push the opponent away while you are spinning up). This would release MAX energy into your opponent at whenever time you hit it.
Cheers, Ewan

[glen]

Featherweight Discs

have a look at car fan motors. any type. also car heater motors are good but they usually have a thin shaft.

your bound to get at least a 240w at 12v motor and ive seen a 1hp at 12v motor. they have serious power and they often come with a flat plate straight out of the armature with a mounting point for 3x m6s.

they are also real durable. that should do the job for you

[craig_anto]

Featherweight Discs

Ewan you really should be aiming for a 3 second or less spin up time
Example: say you take 6 secs to spin it takes most featehrs less than 3 secs to cross the arena
then u get flipped rammed or hit with another disc

Glen the motor is approx 110mm dia 70mm tall weights 1.5kg Ill get the specs later thats all I can remember

[ewan]

Featherweight Discs

The bot is using the drill motors that I have used many times before, and they run at 14.4v instead of the nominal 9.6v, this leads to a 20mph speed, which it can get to within 50cm of floor space...
I could run away for about 12 secs at the start of a fight...
Cheers, Ewan

[maddox]

Featherweight Discs

Forget it Ewan.. from the moment a disk gets up to some serious energy levels this robot becomes an unguided/nominaly guided projectile.

Now, as you think a 12kg machine, with a heavy disk on, eating power as wel, that you can escape a dedicated rambot with thesame amount of power invested in the drive as you in drive and weapon...Think again.

And as the power in feathers reaches nominal heavy values, the armour goes up equaly.
The first Hardox armoured feathers are not far away.

Or, every weapon has it time and place.But non are King of the Hill. After Hypnodisk I feared a Spinner dominated RW. But I did my small part, and now we see a Flipper Dominated gamefield in the Mentorn arena.
And Of course, I do not forget Razer as example. Unfortunatly nobody tied a Hydraulic powered weapon in a feather.

[Mouldy]

Featherweight Discs

I thought Craig danbury did? I also thought i told you that at newark hehe

regards
Dave moulds
Team Turbine

[ewan]

Featherweight Discs

I have no reason to believe that you cannot fit two powerful drive motors, and a good weapon into a featherweight. I do agree that a reasonably powerful disc (vertical) on a bot moving at 20mph can be a bit scary, but there is no reason why this cannot be controlled well, my H5 controllers are excellent.
Cheers, Ewan

[fwsorg]

Featherweight Discs

I would be slightly worries about the H5s, or the motors holding up. I know H5s are very conservatively rated at 10A, but still, using frill motors to go 20 mph whils only drawing 10A would suggest that maybe theyre not as powerful as they could be, and you may find they get rather hot and upset if youre pushing them to the limits as it would seem. I think 15mph max is enough, certainly in the current batch of featherweight arenas, which arnt particularly large (tho were working on rectifying that for FWS2004 :-) Especially with rambots, such as the one Im building, I dont intend to use much more than 25-50% power/speed most of the time, so that the whole thing is jch more controllable and easier to drive and aim at opponents, and then open up the throttle in a storm-esque way once the opponent is on the front. Im working on a featherweight version of the robotec at the moment so that I can program in my own power curves to give me loads of low end control, and then really just a bit of high end welly. As for the hardox feathers, my 4mm hardox is being water-jet cut this week, and im still worried it wont be up to the job of handling Eds new Lem powered feather spinner.

Just to re-iterate whats happened to feathers in the last year, its incredible thinking about it. The weight class has ballooned into a class capable of putting on an excellent show for the public. Weve had the introduction of FeatherWeights.org (plug plug), the 2 excellent inspire events, and of course with the benfit of the heavyweight learning curve, the feathers have come from something like series 2 technology to series 7 in only about 10 months. Its exciting to think what 2004 will bring.

On a more random note, if anyone has yet to get their machines on our featherweight database, and would like to, then please do- its an excellent place for new comers to gain information, inspiration, and for you to gain traffic to your site if you have one :-)

Also, were very nearly full up for FWS2004 9thanks for the great response) so if you havnt yet signed up, please try and do so as soon as possible to avoid dissapointment:-)

Regards,
Eddy
FeatherWeights.org

[ewan]

Featherweight Discs

(note that the H5 can handle around 20 amps continuous, the 10 amps is a minimum rating. And yes I would not be using 20mph all the time, but speed can come as an advantage. anyway back to the point...)
Eds building a bloody f*cking, ass kicking Lem powered spinner. Oh my GOD!!! *quickly phones the hardox store for 11.99kg of the stuff...*
If Ed can put enough power into a Lem at the weight of a featherweight that I will truely praise him as one (if not the) best roboteer of them all. (then again he might be using it at 12v...)

[glen]

Featherweight Discs

wtf? how can you get 20mph out of 9.6v drills. unless you have nearly 250mm of wheels on them i cant see that happening.

and dont rely on ill just drive out of the way because ill tell you what - it doesnt work

[fwsorg]

Featherweight Discs

No disrespect to Ed intended at all here, but I think it would be going wildly over the top to use that as sufficient justification for the accolade of Best roboteer of them all- Its entirely possible on the face of it, just bloody expensive, and would have to be seriously well built (by a good machinist like Gordon Townley for instance) or on a CNC machine for most of us mere mortals who dont have the skill to operate a machine tool to such a required level. Most of us would do such a thing if we could, but only a few of us have the resources to make such dreams a reality.