Haynes Manual Build a Robot

[AdamST180]

Finally managed to get my drills apart to see the motors lol

Drill 1.jpg

[AdamST180]

Due to car buying and house renovations this has been on hold but due to the FeatherTwo ESC's popping back into stock I finally have all the parts I need to get started, this is my basic parts layout, motors will be at the top back corners, will draw these in later

base.jpg

Also got the drill motors out and in the mounts (big thanks to Roboteernat for these, made things so much easier)

MOTOR.jpg

Im planning to use both batteries as ive shown above, or do people recommend just using one? Looking for a wiring diagram to work from and they all seem to show one battery used.

[James Williams]

Are you planning to use the drill batteries? Neophyte runs on only one drill battery but it is rather slow. To be honest most people would recommend running 1 lipo compared to 2 drill batteries, as the lipo would weigh less than both combined & potentially kick out more power depending on your choice (you would need a fuse for that though). If you do run two batteries I recommend wiring them in parallel.

[AdamST180]

My original plan was to use both drill motors but if you think buying a LiPo would be better I will do that, what would be a good one?

[James Williams]

Have a look at this as a starting point: https://hobbyking.com/en_us/turnigy-...html?wrh_pdp=1
It's a 14.8v which is similar to your drill motors & should be OK for the actuator too. You probably could get away with a higher rated (5S) lipo too. Keep in mind that this particular model uses a XT60 connector so you will need to pick up a XT60 connector so you can plug it into the robot. You will also need a proper lipo charger.

There's a couple of threads on here about starting off with lipo's. I'd strongly recommend reading those first before committing to anything.

[AdamST180]

As my A level electronics course was a long time ago im trying to refresh my knowledge on electrics, can anyone recommend a good website or book i can use? Need basic wiring diagrams etc as got all parts needed to wire up a basic bot but no idea where to start or what wire i need to buy?

Im going to use the drill battery's first just to get something moving and working and then go from there

Thanks

[Scarrosaki]

BristolBotBuilders put a nice little guide up, go to the 'Drive Circuit' section on https://bristolbotbuilders.com/guides.html

Would recommend reading through the entire guide as well though.

[Roboteernat]

Hey, glad your going to be getting underway wth the robot again.

Comet, a FW robot uses the argos battery to power the robot. Is a good starting point, considering you would have 2 batteries from the 2 drills already. But it isnt ideal for powering a weapon too.
I use a 2.65 4s lipo on my bot, and that uses about 40% a match and thats with an electric axe. I also have a 4s 3.3a battery, but this is an additional 100g.

Regarding the drive, the Botbitz 80 amp esc are good and very reliable. Comet uses the 30amop ones if i recall - thats not my bot so just remembering.

Alternatively you can reprogram your own esc simply using a usb programmer and a particular brushless esc, so you could do it half price, i will update this post with esc info when i fInd it.

William Cadwallader has some nice build videos of his robot too, https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCBQ...Y8ygoeZ9dlWxDA

[Ocracoke]

Regarding the drive, the Botbitz 80 amp esc are good and very reliable. Comet uses the 30amop ones if i recall - thats not my bot so just remembering.

Yes, Comet uses the 30A versions of the ESC.

Not the same weight class but Jibril uses 10AWG wire with a pair of 4S 4200mAh LiFe batteries to drive both the drive and the Scythe (should probably be looking to change that). In previous iterations of The Honey Badger, this was 12AWG using 2x 2100mAh 3S LiFe batteries. In your case, the wiring is probably going to be simpler if you are only using the one drill battery.

I recently built a wiring loom for a fellow competitor which I guess yours may end up wanting to look like.
simple_wiring_loom.jpg

If you wanted to add in a line for a weapon from the same battery, I'd splice in an extra positive and negative wire at the ends.

[AdamST180]

Cheers guys, i keep looking at it but then giving up as no idea what im doing

I have an ESC the Feathertwo, not worried about a weapon yet just trying to get it running on the ply base i have cut and then go from there

[Scarrosaki]

Cheers guys, i keep looking at it but then giving up as no idea what im doing

I have an ESC the Feathertwo, not worried about a weapon yet just trying to get it running on the ply base i have cut and then go from there

Feathertwo is very simple setup, it basically goes:

Battery -> link -> Feathertwo battery inputs (the single pair of red and black wires at one end) -> red pair to one motor, black pair to second motor (other end of esc).

Be sure to check the polarity from battery to esc, red to red, black to black before powering it up for the first time, as reverse polarity will damage the feathertwo.

Plug the two rx connectors into your rx, white wire top, into the Ele and Ail inputs. The Feathertwo has a builtin BEC and will provide power to the receiver.

You might want to connect the two motors to the esc via screw terminals before soldering, so you can swap them around if one drive motor is spinning the wrong direction on inputs.

Once you're happy it tests out OK with screw terminals, would recommend soldering XT connectors for everything and labelling them for future reference.

[AdamST180]

Feathertwo is very simple setup, it basically goes:

Battery -> link -> Feathertwo battery inputs (the single pair of red and black wires at one end) -> red pair to one motor, black pair to second motor (other end of esc).

Be sure to check the polarity from battery to esc, red to red, black to black before powering it up for the first time, as reverse polarity will damage the feathertwo.

Plug the two rx connectors into your rx, white wire top, into the Ele and Ail inputs. The Feathertwo has a builtin BEC and will provide power to the receiver.

You might want to connect the two motors to the esc via screw terminals before soldering, so you can swap them around if one drive motor is spinning the wrong direction on inputs.

Once you're happy it tests out OK with screw terminals, would recommend soldering XT connectors for everything and labelling them for future reference.

Sounds good, i can follow that does the ESC have inputs for both batteries? Or would i wire them up in series?

[Ocracoke]

does the ESC have inputs for both batteries? Or would i wire them up in series?

You would need to wire it up in series (for increased voltage) or in parallel (for increased capacity) to get power to the ESC.

[Scarrosaki]

If you're using the Argos drill batteries and motors, would recommend just running a single battery to start with until you're happy with the wiring before thinking about adding a second battery in parallel or series.

Whilst the Feathertwo can handle running 2 batteries in series for a combined 24V, doing so will be overvolting the motors and pushing the Ampage limits of the esc which is not a great thing to try if it's first build territory, just adds a ton of extra things to go wrong.

[McMullet]

I think the original Haynes manual just uses one of the batteries, which should be fine for testing that it works and a bit of driving around. The battery itself might have some overcurrent protection, in which case it should cut out if you try to draw too much current, but I'm not 100% sure if that's in the battery or the controller in the drill power switch. May well depend on the model of drill.

In any case, it's probably best to play it safe once everything's up and running, and put in a your own battery with known specs and a suitable fuse, otherwise you're kinda running blind in that regard. Even with two batteries in parallel, if they don't have any protection and you stall both motors you could be drawing over 100 A and that could potentially fry the ESC, motor or result in a battery going pop (in theory that type of battery shouldn't full on explode and kill anyone if shorted but will make a big enough bang to require a change of underwear).

EDIT: Scarrosaki beat me to it on the first point!