New guy in need of help

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dcr raptor
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New guy in need of help

Post by dcr raptor »

Hello, I have a few questions as to what I should use for my antweight that I am planning on building this year.

1- Would a Spektrum DX7 transmitter and AR7000 receiver be a good choice or would there be a better alternative for a similar or lower price?
2- How much do the names of robots have to be different from each other? (e.g. a name containing the name of another robot having a name spelt and pronounced very similarly)
3- Would a robot featuring a mixture of wheels and legs count as a roller or a walker?
4- How would I work out what the most appropriate battery for my antweight would be?
5- Aside from tape, glue, clips or brackets, are there any other commonly used methods of holding components and armour in place?

Any answers are appreciated, thanks.
haz
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Re: New guy in need of help

Post by haz »

hi, and welcome to the forum :)

dx7 is a bit overkill, i personally use the DX5e (some prefer the DX6i, which is nicer because it has model memory and some nice features, but is more expensive)
it all depends on where the robot is from, and whether or not it is currently competing as it could get very confusing when fights are called at an event. i would say try to come up with something original.
it would probably be a roller, i struggle to see how you would implement a leg and wheel design, perhaps a picture or drawing? would be interesting to see.
bolts, screws, single piece armor/frames that are milled or 3d printed. just off the top of my head.
dcr raptor
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Re: New guy in need of help

Post by dcr raptor »

Thanks, do you think that the name 'Dominant Force' would cause confusion or could I get away with that one?
The walker with wheels idea was for a possible future antweight design.
Remote-Controlled Dave
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Re: New guy in need of help

Post by Remote-Controlled Dave »

Haz seems to have covered all that well. I think Dominant Force would be absolutely fine as a name. We've had much closer than that in the past (Ant and Anto, Inertia and Inertiant etc)
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BeligerAnt
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Re: New guy in need of help

Post by BeligerAnt »

Hi and welcome!
1, DX7 is rather an expensive solution. There are plenty of alternatives available with adequate performance for an antweight at significantly lower cost. Search through the forum, most of them have been discussed before! Go for a 2.4GHz 4-channel set-up.
2. Dominant Force will be fine. Deliberately coming up with something that sounds indistinguishable from an existing well-known robot would probably be unpopular...
3. If it has wheels for propulsion, it's a roller. Walkers can ONLY use legs for propulsion.
4. Battery options depend on type of drive & weapon and battery technology. If you are using Li-Po, then usually 2 cells in series (7.4V) with a capacity of around 200mAh is a good starting point. If you (or rather your robot!) need to lose weight then you can go down to around 110mAh but will need to re-charge more often. If you are going for 4WD and/or a big powerful spinner you might need to go to 250 or 300 mAh. You can go to 3 cells (11.1V) but mostly 7.4V is fine.
If you want to use NiMH batteries you will be limited by weight and availability, go for 4 cells (4.8V) or 5 cells (6V) and probably the smallest cells you can find.
5. Nothing wrong with Gaffa tape! :) Some plastics (HDPE) can be welded. Glue is not terribly good for most plastics. Nuts & bolts work well, M2 or M3 size is sufficient and commonly available. Nylon M3 screws are much lighter than steel and strong enough for antweights.

That's probably enough from me for now ;) Good luck, and have fun!
Gary, Team BeligerAnt
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joey_picus
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Re: New guy in need of help

Post by joey_picus »

Hiya, welcome to the world of antweights :)

1: I use a DX7 and it is a good transmitter if you need to mess with endpoints and in-transmitter mixing, which I do entirely too much, but there are cheaper computer transmitters (as suggested) which cover that, and you can build an entirely functional and winning and effective antweight without ever going near the finer points of transmitters, so a DX4 or DX5e would probably be a better solution (five channels is nice to have in case you want to actuate a weapon on a switch without having to mess around with the inside of the transmitter to add something to short one of the joysticks!).

I can't really reccommend the build quality of the DX7 though, I've been looking into rehousing it somehow...

2: I'm still amazed it took that long for someone to make an antweight just called 'Ant'!

3: What Gary said, basically. It depends how you might be using the wheels though (if they're powered in any way, then no, but if you're using them as essentially unpowered, round, free-moving feet - as on Pilgrim - you might have a case to be considered a walker, although at ant level I can't see how that would come up)

4: http://www.micronradiocontrol.co.uk/lipo_hyperion.html are the batteries I use, I find that I can go down to 120mah and still have enough charge for a couple of full fights or about fifteen minutes' driving practice, so if you are struggling for weight you can reduce the capacity a little with no problem. I'm not certain any robots currently competing still use NiMh batteries, but those are an option, and if you're really strapped for cash 9V batteries are a possible idea, but ideally I would start out using LiPos as you will probably upgrade to them anyway if you use anything else.

5: All of my robots are bolted together for the most part (save Head Over Heels, but that is a ZX Microdrive) but components which don't have to be held absolutely rigidly in place (e.g. batteries and electronics) can be held down by tape - double sided foam tape works well - or even Velcro, which is extremely useful for batteries as it makes changing them very simple!

One note on glue - use two-part epoxy if you need to use it, ordinary glue won't be strong enough and Superglue (cyanoacrylate) will severely weaken and ruin polycarbonate...
Joey McConnell-Farber - Team Picus Telerobotics - http://picus.org.uk/ - @joey_picus
"These dreams go on when I close my eyes...every second of the night, I live another life"
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