Robot, or a Robotic cart or wagon

[jfischer]

Yes, I am planning on building it, don't think I would find what I am looking for built, unless it would be something that someone is wanting to get rid of.

You did post you were gona build.
I dont know if you are gona find a unit ready to go for your needs.

[jfischer]

Hey Nick, I didn't realize that was you, or your unit you had built in the YouTube video until I looked at it again.

I think I have enough stuff around here to build it, minus the materials. I have a small vertical mill, a small lathe, Lincoln Mig, Miller Tig and TONS of tools. Now the big thing is to get the ideas together and collect all that is needed.

I know what you are talking about with things getting expensive for the electronics as things get larger. I have been playing over the Winter with R/C Rock Crawlers and the on Berg Motor over axle unit I have built has seperate speed controllers for each motor and I can vary them as to speed and to lock the rear for the Dig unit and such. There is $1200-1500 I would say in it. I would rather stick with a wheel transmitter over a dual stick, and make the mixes up in the radio, rather then using a stick radio. Many people in the rock crawlers are using relays to make the Dig unit (basically to lock the rear motor to spin it around sharper on turns) and I am using two speed controls to get much more out of it.

I guess one of the biggest things is to decide on what axles and drive setup to use on it. I would kind of like to go with a caster wheel setup in the front and vary the motor speed to the rear motors rather then having a skid steer design (I remember that tearing the yards up pretty good when I was a mechanic and a walking guy. Used to work on Bobcats) . Don't think I am going to find a servo big enough to steer it, and by changing speed on each rear motor I could turn it that way.

I am getting a few ideas now on things, Nick did you just build yours as you went along and collected parts?, or build off any kind of plans you had put together.

Going to a crawling get together tonight, I will throw it past a few of those guys and see what they think.
Jeff

[larrwill]

I made an old electric wheel chair into an RC vehicle and made a tow hitch for it to pull a wagon. Could you switch to using an electric wheelchair and just tow while riding?

Here are some videos of what I made. I now have a different wagon and hitch which I have not made a video for yet that works much better.

http://www.youtube.com/larrwill

[monte55]

How did you connect your receiver to the speed controller of the chair?
Nick

[larrwill]

I used the stock wheelchair motor controller, disconnected the joystick and made the small board you see next to the joystick. The board has a microcontroller (Microchip 16F777) and a few other parts. I wrote a program to translate the RC signal into a simulation of the joystick.