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....
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