Chassis Testing

Today consisted of testing the chassis and its ability to traverse the vertical board. Testing initially went well until one of the drive gears began to slip on the drive shaft. This required disassembly of the offending drive unit, and re-tightening of the grub screws.

Once this was accomplished, the chassis proved adept at traversing the board. It was capable of travelling vertically and turning almost on point. It is unlikely that this configuration of robot will ever tutn exactly on point as the tacky nature of the wheels will prevent slippage on the one that is stationary. If you are interested in watching the videos, get them here: [left] [right] [straight]

Assembly

Here are images of the initial assembly of the robot. The next stage will be the testing of the chassis on the vertical chalk-board (shown at the bottom of the image set).

Once the capabilities of the chassis are determined, the necessary modifications will be made and the PC-104 embedded computer stack will be mounted, with control being maintained over the wireless network.

Pre-Assembly

Shown here is the "exploded view" of the robot prior to assembly. In the centre is the main chassis, alongside which are the symmetrical left and right drive gearboxes. At the extreme ends are the magnetic wheels.

At the rear is the original jockey idea. This may have to be modified if it hinders the turning capability of the robot in any way.

Arrayed along the bottom are various close-ups of the different elements of the system.

Second Wheel

Results from the second casting effort were good, probably better overall than the first. Surface finish was again excellent. At this stage I am convinced that the results from this design have been better due in part to the new cutters used when machining but mostly to the release agent used when casting. Neither of the mold-boxes had to be destroyed and both wheels slid relatively easily out during the de-molding process.

The upper photograph shows the various components used in the manufacture of one wheel. Clockwise from extreme left: Magnet, inner grip, hub, outer grip. Below is a close-up of the wheel showing the surface finish.