E-Maxx Gone Bot!!!?!!?

[Frapechino]

This is one of the best looking project that I have ever seen, this guy took an e-maxx and converted it so taht he could run it in battle bots fights it runs four 550 motors tons of batteries and is composed mainly of E-Maxx tranny and drivlines and tons of Sanyo batteries....by the way, in no way am I attempting to take this fellows work, I am merly spreading an awsome job well done...

http://www.rcarchive.com/robot/irrigator/construction/10-2-01/render02.gif
underneath...
http://www.rcarchive.com/pics/stand.jpg
with its irragation box body...
http://www.rcarchive.com/pics/irrigatorbot.jpg

[Frapechino]

ohh sorry i meant 8 motors...:rolleyes:

[flyfishingbear]

Is there any way I could get the CAD files? I'm working on some mods for my three trucks and a cad of the base would be a big timesaver. Or the address of the guy you got it from.thanks

[punkrockracer]

1 word for that guy...GENIOUS!! and if he makes it on battle bots i hope he spreads the word of the hobby turning sport to the world and definatly give traxxas/e-maxx credit for the awesome truck that i know should hold up for him in those intense battles...mine sure handles 12 foot drops on it's shell and plowing into big, sharp rocks at near 30 mph

**edited for grammar/spelling**

[Janders]

NASA even uses stuff designed by hobbyists. The space center in Alamogordo, NM( I grew up with Clyde Tombaugh if anyone knows him, and Col. Stapp). has a
Mars rover, and it 's 'shoes' are Tamiya All Terrain tires!

[Grant Tokumi]

Thanks for the kind words people. That happens to be my creation. Irrigator's the name, 60 lb robot fighting is its game. :) Its been fighting it in a few local competitions already. She's pretty fast compared to other bots, and the MT tires provide great traction. I'm frankly amazed that I've had pretty good success with her performance at the competitions entered. However, I've also had my share of shredding and plastic explosions as well. Both is fun. If anyone was at the last RCX, I also had her on display at the Steel Conflict arena.

I definitely try to spread the word in the bot fighting world on the use of rc car parts and try to set a good example with using the emaxx parts. Its funny when bot builders ask me how I machined such great gearboxes and cool looking blue anodized motor mounts too. :) I also try to promote robot fighting to you rc guys on the fun and possibilities of building fighting robots too. Nowadays, there is so much info and packages out there.

BTW Frapechino, the truck behind it is a RC10GT. ;) Shhh.

flyfishingbear,
If you want the CAD file, I can give it to you, but I will in no way shape or form, guarantee the accuracy of the parts. To give a feel of tolerances, I measured those parts off of my emaxx using a wooden 18" ruler, and a $1.50 caliper barely accurate to an 1/8" .. :)

[nitroburner9248]

hey how much was it for you to buy CAD?

[Frapechino]

hey its you!!!.....lol.....ahh so it was an RC10GT.....well I'm glad your here...glad you don't mine me spreading your great work...

[flyfishingbear]

I'd really appreciate the CAD files, you could email them to me at
magunde@netscape.net

that's not my main address, but I hate getting spamed from addresses on forums. I can refine the dimensions on my CAD programs, but it will be a great start, thanks

[Grant Tokumi]

I don't mind people spreading the word at all. :)

I use Autocad at work so in that sense I didn't pay anything for it. I understand that the program can be quite pricey, guessing around $500. If I'm not mistaken, rc companies and others designing 3d things like this, use more ProE or Solidworks for the designs. I use Autocad cause I'm really familiar with it and use it everyday.

Here's some pictures and videos of Irrigator and my modified clodbuster 12 lb class robot too. Page is not 100% done, but most of the stuff is there.
http://www.rcarchive.com/robot/irrigator/irrigator.html

"Battle History" has the action pics and movies.

[flyfishingbear]

I'm using Rhinoceros 3.0 and Intellicad, my son's used autocad when they were in college, but now they use these so we all can send our stuff to each other, so it can be designed in one place, machined in my sons shop, and tested and modified elsewhere. I'm trying to apply design and racing experience in 1:1 to these cars, they're a lot cheaper to race, $10K for 3 trucks instead of 100k for one real car. We've been kicking around robot designs for a while, it looks like a ton of fun. What weapons are you planning on using, or is it just the wedge for now? After, KISS is always a good way to start.

[Grant Tokumi]

You sounds like a future bot builder to me. :) I sent the drawing to you.

Irrigator is pretty much maxed out in the weight department already so I could not afford to add any active weapon. That was a bummer. If you look at my early design drawings, my initial intent was to have a rotating arm to self-right myself if flipped, and flip opponents too. The flipping arm used 2 kiddy car gearboxes. The two 550 motors with around 110:1 gear reduction was still not strong enough to flip myself over.

Hopefully the CAD file helps you out. They should be good for general design, but if the intent is to throw the caded pieces into a program and CNC machine to spit out new parts, I would not trust it to that close tolerances. I guess you can judge on your own when you look at the drawing.

Robot fighting is a blast. Lots of "anticipation" because you spend all this time in design and building, and you never you if you'll come out of the arena with a victory or a box with bot remains in it. But you know its fun when the builders are having a good time with either outcome. I guess I can compare it to coming out of a close race victory, even though you fried your $200 engine. Or blasting trucks over huge jumps and going home with the truck in 2 pieces but a smile on your face. "It was worth it" kind of feeling.

[MegaMe]

"man i just detroyed $1000 of emaxx bits... but it was worth it"

dont think its my sport - i just cant see myself saying that :p

[flyfishingbear]

I can, I got the chassis file, hope to see the rest soon. I was thinking of an inverted saucer outer shell, and using the vaccum to the floor trick like the sumo bots do, kind of a limpet design ( does my biology/ medical background show) We looked at some of the rotating mass designs but when they make contact they seem to hurt themselves almost as much as the opponent. We figured if the whole shell rotated and the weights came out with centrifical force it would be a sleek wedge when defending, and armed when spinning. Good cabin fever kinda project. thanks for your help, Mark
Oh yeah, I'll remeasure everything with a mic and verneer caliper to get the fits right, but this is a great base to start from.

[Grant Tokumi]

That file had whatever I had drawn up for the bot. I froze out the irrigation box and other layers to just keep the emaxx parts shown for you, much like the rendering picture shown in the first post. You just turn on and thaw the other layers to see everything else I have in that drawing file. Or if your program does not import things frozen or turned off for whatever reason, let me know and I'll resend the file with everything on and thawed.

But note that I did stop the design in CAD after I got the irrigation box fitted over all the main inside components, so you won't see the ENTIRE bot in that file. The outer armor, and wheel protection was done with the other popular bot designing method: CAD - cardboard aided design. :)


"man i just detroyed $1000 of emaxx bits... but it was worth it"

haha. I hear ya. Believe it or not, I'm a cheap ass myself. I use stock MAXX tires because they are cheaper on ebay. I still use stock EMAXX upper arms and bulkheads because thats what I had in my inventory and they seem to hold up fine. It did end up hitting me hard when I was forced to upgrade to Supermaxx axles, aluminum rims and stuff like that. But since I've kind of spread all the parts and upgrades out over 2+ years now, it makes it a bit easier on the finances.

Since the electronics (esc, batteries) is usually the most expensive parts, I put large emphasis (sometimes too much) in trying not to stall the motors or do other things that will fry the electronics. She's designed to have driveline parts "breakaway" instead of bending and jamming into itself which is the sort of thing that leads to stalls and fried electronics. RC car parts such as cvds work GREAT for the "breakway" concept. If tires get blasted, the tires and axles just go away and leaves the outdrives so nothing sticks out to get caught and jammed on anything. And projectile tires makes for good audience entertainment too.

[Grant Tokumi]

I had to look it up. :)
http://octopus.gma.org/Tidings/limpet.html

Interesting concept with weight lifting up with centrifugal force. Matches the limpet design, and still relatively KISS. Plus, since the inertia changes as you spin faster and weights spread out, I wonder if it helps spin up times. You can have a faster spin up with the weights tucked in, and larger inertia and stored kinetic energy once the weights open up.