Build Diary

Whoa!! This past year has been busy on the robot front. We started off 2002 getting the robot ready for its first fights in Worthing at the Sussex Robot Rumble. We rebuilt the complete top of the robot so that the whole thing can be detached. We also used cold-bent steel box for the top, reducing the number of welds and making the whole machine much much stronger.

Just prior to Worthing, we found that the batteries were failing. As we were using the same ones that Panda-Monium used, we decided to buy some new 17Ah ones from Technobots. This meant we had to change the wiring from series-parallel to just series. Cool!

We got to Worthing and borrowed some batteries from Andrew (Tornado). We entered the arena and....nothing. It creeked a bit, but nothing else. A quick look revealed that I'd wired the batteries in parallel instead of series - a massive 12v!!! We did manage to get it working again and fought, but were quickly turned over. The self-righting failed to work and we were stuck. Once someone turned us back, everything was fine...more work to do!

We spent quite some time working on the robot after this. We built a device on the back to help it self-right by making the machine (very) unstable. We foam filled the tyres with pipe insulation backed up with inner tubes. We re-wired the whole robot and managed to reduce 13 metres of cabling down to about 6m. Still too long in my opinion, but better certainly. We seem to be suffering from over-heating on the speed controllers. The front panels were re-made and now don't need to be removed (except when damaged). We also modified the side so that the C02 cylinder can be removed quickly (about 1 minute). The batteries can be changed in about 3 mins now and are centrally mounted.

By the time we were ready for qualifying of Robot Wars: The Sixth Wars, we were getting quietly confident...hmmm....