Beetleweight WIP

Beetleweight WIP

In my last post, I mentioned that I was planning on building my own beetleweight robot- and I have started to do just that! Here I will tell you what I have accomplished so far.

My Design

My idea for this robot is a 4 wheel drive robot with a large vertical spinning disk at the front. The robot will be longer than it is wide, and will hopefully be able to drive upside down (although the weapon won't be able to spin if it does).

What We Bought

For this project we bought the 'Beetleweight Brushed Drive Kit' from the Bristol Bot Builders website along with an extra set of wheels for my design. We also purchased a 3S LiPo battery, a charger, and a fireproof guard to charge the battery in. We got screws, bolts and other useful things to hold the robot together. For building a prototype version, we got a few plastic chopping boards of varying thicknesses to build a temporary frame. We also needed a transmitter, so we bought a Flysky i6 transmitter.

Building The Prototype

We measured and cut a base piece 210 x 125 mm out of a 3mm thick chopping board. We then attempted to cut the side pieces (205 x 30mm) and supports (105 x 30mm) out of 7mm plastic. At least, we thought it was plastic when we looked at it, however it turned out to be MDF, which was surprising! My design has the drive motors mounted at the back of the robot, so we tried to drill 22mm holes into the MDF to allow them to fit in. However, as MDF is basically glorified cardboard, one of the pieces broke when we attempted to drill the holes. After re-cutting a side piece, we began to screw the frame together. Unfortunately, the pieces weren't perfectly cut so nothing quite lined up and, as a bonus, the MDF pieces began to split when we tried to screw them together.


Coming back the next day, we re-cut the side pieces and supports out of real plastic, even cutting the side panels to have some of the angles that would be in the final design. This time, nothing broke when we screwed it together. Using M4 bolts, I attached the unpowered wheels. This prototype is going to have four wheels but only be two wheel drive for now. After successfully building the frame and mounting the drive motors, it was time for the electronics. 


We attached the motor ESCs to the motors (cable ties, for now) and connected them to the breakout cable with terminal block connections along with the safety LED, which is temporary for this prototype. Then we needed to solder! First, we soldered the wires that connect from the battery to the breakout cable, via the removable link that is necessary for all robots. Then we soldered the pins onto the receiver, and attached one of the BEC wires to the receiver. Finally, we soldered the ESC wires onto the motors and paired the robot to the transmitter.







Testing

Here is the test footage. All that this prototype needed to do was drive, and I think it did that quite well! It was reasonably fast, turned well, and was quite easy to control. I am very proud of our progress, and look forward to the finished result!


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