pic: 1529 Lollipop Manipulator
 

Re: pic: 1529 Lollipop Manipulator
 

This is a VERY interesting, and unique design. Do these cam outward to grab the tube, or do they just rotate concentrically into place? How to you power this mechanism? Any video?

Cool design, hope it works as good as it looks.

BEN

Re: pic: 1529 Lollipop Manipulator
 

The outer (green) lolly is driven clockwise, the inner (red) lolly is stationary. We use the drill motor, geared down, to drive. Although the Lollipop went into the crate before we got our video cameras out, it was working flawlessly at a speed of 1.7 seconds.

Re: pic: 1529 Lollipop Manipulator
 

Drill motor?

Re: pic: 1529 Lollipop Manipulator
 

Just a question- are you planning to hypnotize people with this thing, because it might just work if you spun them for a while and had someone look right at the center (I had to ask when I saw the rings through the cutouts).

But seriously, that looks nice- hope it works for you.

Re: pic: 1529 Lollipop Manipulator
 

Cool looking design. Great idea, looks like it should work well.

I hate to bring this up, but you mentioned using a drill motor. You may want to check <R46> in the rules. It has many parts, but I'd like to call your attention to this section on items specifically prohibited: "Electric motors different from, or in addition to, those in the Kit, with the exception of those specifically permitted by Rule <R45>." <R45> basically sets limits to how many extra KOP motors you can use.

<R38> seems to indicate this is an attempt to keep the robots on the same power level. However I seem to recall seeing some robots with drills powering parts at competition last year. I didn't look very closely at the time to see if they were modified to use KOP motors. There are some whitepapers describing how that's done. For example: http://www.chiefdelphi.com/media/papers/1592

Re: pic: 1529 Lollipop Manipulator
 

All motors we use came in the 2007 kit; we call one of them a "drill motor" but it may go by a different name.
EDIT: The motor in question is the Globe Motor 409A587, found in the red tote this year. Sorry for the confusion. And, thanks for your concern.

Re: pic: 1529 Lollipop Manipulator
 

Most likely the fisher price. They're small, bare, and pretty powerful.