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Saturday 20th December 2003
I finally found some time from Christmas activities to have a look
at the damage I'd received in the recent Worthing event. One drive sprocket had
been bent, but I managed to hammer it more or less flat again once I had
removed the axle assembly from the robot. I had noticed that the other drive
wasn't working, but this was due to an electrical problem, not a mechanical one
this time.
I was hoping it wasn't the motor controller that had died,
but on closer inspection I found that one wiring block terminal that connected
the motor wires to the controller was all melted. While at the Worthing event
the left hand side motor connectors had become loose, but I didn't check the
right hand side while I was at it. It seems that the screw terminals were loose
on this side too, but instead of the motor simply not working at all, the
connector must have been arcing and eventually overheated and melted the
plastic surrounds. This eventually insulated the wired from the terminal and
the motors failed to run. I had to cut the terminal block out and replace it
with a new one, after which the drives worked on both sides. |
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Monday 29th December
2003
For a while I have been mulling over how I might manage to gain
access to the gas bottle once it is fitted within the Hog, so that I can turn
the gas on and off without either removing a front panel, or sliding my hand
under the flipper. Having recently looked over Paul Cooper's M2 robot at the
Worthing event, I noticed that he had attached a hexagonal nut to his gas
bottle fitting instead of the normal nobly round handle grip, and had drilled a
hole opposite this in the outer panels. He could then simply turn the bottle on
and off using a box spanner or socket on a short extension.
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I decided I could do a similar thing so welded a 19mm nut to
a plate of metal that I had filed a square hole in. This now screwed onto the
square shaft on the top of the gas bottle tap. |
I next had to cut away a part of the chassis because the gas
bottle lined up nicely right behind a cross member. I welded a couple of other
supports to strengthen the member I had butchered, leaving me with the last job
of cutting a hole in the outer panel. |
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The trusty tank cutter made quick work of the polyprolene
panel and I was now virtually there. The only thing to consider now was whether
to make a purpose built tool to turn the gas bottle on and off, or to simply
use a conventional socket and lever, but this decision I can leave until
another day. |
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