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Author Topic: Newbie to robots  (Read 3533 times)

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Offline ziomatrixacsTopic starter

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Newbie to robots
« on: November 03, 2008, 12:35:30 PM »
Hey guys, I am new to robots and I have been trying to get into it.

I fly model airplanes ( from 30" electrics to 30% gassers ) so I have servos of all sizes, 3.6 gram blue arrow's up to Futaba S3303's, 8 channel receivers , brushless motors with esc's and plenty of nuts and bolts. I also have a few helicopters from years back.. I used to build with legos for about 16 years too. (Mostly robots when RCX came out, and a few before then with parts I found from RC cars)

Right now I have a Netburner Mod 5213. I think its kinda old, but it is a micro computer though.  Id like to get back into robots, but I use an older Macintosh so I cant really run the C++ compiler for the MOD5213 and need a USB  to serial cable to program it. Im not too good with circuitry, but Im good with cobbling something up to get it to do what I want it to. (Example, I made a robot with Two motors that had ESC's that only ran forward. I ran a servo connected to a polarity switch to reverse the + and - so I could get the motors to run backwards. Inefficient but it worked!)

Any way.. Im looking to build a small radio controlled frame. Instead of having a programed Microcomputer, I could use an aircraft radio to run a frame. It would be much easier on my part, since I enjoy building the robot more than programing.  Are there any metal geared transmissions for a 250 class motor? Similar to this tamiya (sp) drive:

http://static.flickr.com/90/239971526_4cb81f79af.jpg

I build a robot with those treads and same tranny but it strips out like crazy. I have lego gears but id like to avoid using those.. I am having a hard time finding premade metal gear (micro?) transmissions.. If I could get some heavier nylon gears, that would be great too.

Offline ArcMan

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Re: Newbie to robots
« Reply #1 on: November 03, 2008, 01:30:44 PM »
I also have not seen any quality small transmissions - just that cheap plastic junk.  I build my own with parts from Stock Drive.

http://www.sdp-si.com/

Your mileage may vary.  I have a little machine shop.  I don't have all the goodies, but enough to get by.


Offline Razor Concepts

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Re: Newbie to robots
« Reply #2 on: November 03, 2008, 01:59:41 PM »
Hey a fellow RCer, right now I only do helicopters as I never got my scratchbuilt planes flying  :P

How about using two servos to drive the two treads? I bet you have a few metal geared servos laying around, and it doesnt take much to convert them to continuous rotation.

Offline ziomatrixacsTopic starter

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Re: Newbie to robots
« Reply #3 on: November 03, 2008, 04:35:27 PM »
I dont have a machine shop unfortunately..(technically "fortunately", if I had one, robots would roam the earth! ::) )

I have a few JR 8417's that could be modded, but it kills me to cut up a $100 servo for a robot. I got some cheapie ancient airtronics servo and they will work but are too slow. The plastic drive I use is very fast for its size.

Offline ArcMan

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Re: Newbie to robots
« Reply #4 on: November 03, 2008, 08:20:42 PM »
Well if you want to do a small RC controlled frame, you could use gearmotors.  Attach wheels directly to the gearmotors like I did on my first robot.





 


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