|
How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
While we were on our way to our first competition this year, one of our mentors who had gone early to uncrate the robot decided to call and say that they had gotten the chance to go in and weigh the robot and we were 6 lbs. overweight!:ahh: After about ten minutes, he called back and said that he was just kidding and he just wanted us to come up with drastic weight loss ideas. Anybody have any ideas?
Here's a few basics: SWISS CHEESE like crazy smaller motors |
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
remove any extra plexi glass and decorations that add to the weight.
Or just remove the wheels:D Chris |
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
It all depends on the robot....hopefully you know ahead of time how much it really weighs!
We learned this lesson last year, and the weight budget was an important part of design/ build |
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
Well do you have an arm bot, ramp bot, or both. If you have two ramps, if it comes down to it you can get rid of one.
|
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
6 pounds? That's nothing. Two days before ship in 2005, we found out we were 60 pounds overweight. The quickest way to lose weight was to scrap most of the drivetrain, swiss cheese the thing, mill down all of our monster gears, and then go over the whole thing with dremels and files to cut out as much as possible. I still don't know how we managed to do it.
|
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
I don't know about the robot since we didn't have that problem this year. However I did tell my wife I wanted to lose 20lbs of ugly fat quickly. She told me to cut off my head. Go figure.
|
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
Yeah. We didn't have that problem this year. It's probably the first time we can actually say that.
|
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
This is the first year we didn't have a weight loss problem because we painstakingly did everything in CAD, made sure all the material properties were set, and also designed 10 pounds under.
In 2005 we were about 10 pounds over, we spent the last week filling every square inch of the bot with holes except for the chassis. Our anodized chassis plate was covered in sharpie marks after all the cutting so we doused it in isopropyl alcohol and set it on fire :cool: Not as quick as scrubbing it with solvent, but much more fun. |
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
we were about 10 lbs. over this year. we had designed our arm to have an azimuth turntable, but that had to go:(. we ended up not being able to save enough though so we took off one of our lifters.
|
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
Quote:
BTW Great job At the bolermaker reagional.I heard the story and that is too bad about the other robots in the semis. but great job getting as far as you did!!!! |
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
Quote:
This year I asked our mechanical lead several times during the build season, "If we had to cut weight, what would we take out?" Our mechanical lead made sure that we weighed the robot at least once a week, and we weighed every part that we made before it went on and kept track of it. |
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
Quote:
I remember, though I wasn't on the team, our 2005 bot was swiss-cheesed like crazy, as was the lexan wall on our '06 bot (5-ft long board of lexan= HEAVY. 5-ft long board of swiss-cheesed lexan: LIGHT). We did better on our '07 bot, but we were still 1-2 lbs. over, so we swiss cheesed our arm stuff and that was that. |
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
This year we weighed in at 119.9 of 120.
Last year (rookie year) we made our electrical panel out of two sheets of 3/8 plexiglass, which was eventually swiss-cheesed beyond recognition. This year we made it out of 1/16 fiber composite (grade GR-10/FR-4 Garolite). P.S. Garolite is amazing stuff. |
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
Quote:
|
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
we are adding weight on thursday. about 15 lbs worth i think.
|
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
Two years in a row our team has made the mistake of weighing our robot with the scale on carpet, which makes the weight seem significantly lower than it really is, until it finally occurs to us that our robot looks way heavier than the scales says and discover the problem. By this time it's usually hours before ship and we're scrapping major components.
|
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
Last season with 1293, we started Palmetto about four pounds overweight. We went to two pounds underweight in one day with a few changes.
Anybody familiar with 1293 is familiar with the team's love for 1/8" aluminum. The hopper that year used a lot of it, so we initially cut large holes in it and filled those holes with garden mesh riveted in place (and painted, natch). When that didn't cut it, we took a slugbuster (a hydraulic device for putting round holes in things, in this case with a little hand pump) to it. Ultimately, we had the hopper remade in a Fix-It Window using thin-gauge stainless steel, which we then re-swiss-cheesed. The end result was plenty durable (even for blocking shots--sorry, 1676), but far lighter. Similarly, we could've fabricated a lot of things differently with 1618's robot this year. Paper is a terribly underrated material--we're using it for our graphics, with a few extra numbers printed up as spares. On the arm, the numbers are backed by a piece of cardboard. Sure, it might not be particularly heavy-duty--but it'll hold, and replacements are cheap and plentiful. Similarly, we picked pegboard over metal for our electronics and pneumatics panels--they're cheap, easy to mount to, and light as beans. If we needed to drop weight (which we don't--ten pounds under FTW!), we can get it cut with nearly anything. Oh, and don't count out the kit wheels either--they're nice and light, and are roughtopped with relative ease. And, if worst comes to worst, never be afraid to ask around for advice. Odds are that someone at the event will have some tool or part that will knock a pound or two off. |
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
On the shipping date 10min before the FEDEX guy came we weight our robot and found that we were 10lbs overweight. As it turned out the scale that we used was very shoddy and we were actually 5lbs under. As an example of the shoddiness of the scale, I could change my own weight 25lbs up or down.
|
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
We found our team weight to be exactly out team number: 114 pounds. It was entirely accidental, and pretty awesome.
|
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
The most important lesson is that every team should buy a scale. They come in handy more than you can imagine. No need to cut 6 pounds at competition, you can weigh everything as it goes on the robot and weigh the robot at different points.
Buy a scale. |
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
We were 1 pound over weight and so we took the chains off that ran to the front two wheels of our 6-wheel drive robot. #35 chain is heavy and taking it out can save u if u need it. then u can take out holes and bring the chain back onto the robot.
-Martin |
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
Quote:
This year, we had to remove two of the four clippard tanks to save nearly 2 pounds. Oh, and about 2 pounds of excess armor (we let the bumpers do the work). At one point, we were seriously considering drilling out the center of fasteners.:eek: ========= On a more serious side, there is a process by which a team can triage what is essential and what can go. List and prioritize all of your tasks. Start with your least important quality (ours was 'score on the middle rack') and remove that feature. Keep removing the least important feature until you make weight. This, of course, only after all non-essential parts are removed, and holes are placed in anything that doesn't need the structural strength. For example, in 2005 we saves 1/2 pound per wheel by drilling holes in the (heavy rubber) treads. Don |
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
We were actually underweight this year, not sure by how much, and didn't even specifically design it that way. Two years ago I remember us the weekend before shipping drilling holes in all of our sprockets. We seriously must have drilled out nearly half of the weight of each sprocket....and it was done in a symmetrical pattern, so they actually looked pretty cool afterwards :)
|
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
Quote:
a scale said that one of my teammates (who weighs about 150) weighed about -4 pounds with his back pack on. (and yes, the scale was calibrated and on tile) |
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
yeah GRR had two robots, one ~10lbs under and the other one ~1-2 lbs over our weight class. besides swiss cheesing The programing team had to have more 0's than 1's in the code :D
on a more serious note: drill holes in places like under the rc and speed controllers if it really comes down to it. Do not punch any holes in a part of the frame that bears any weight or is a support. If possible replace any lexan/polycarbonate with a thinner sheet. if you can replace 1/8 with 1/16 it still should hold up fine. If you guys have a camera on board and aren't using it take all wires, hardware, "perches" off for us that claimed about 1.5 lbs. Also, if you have a compressor or pneumatics check to see if you can get away with having four tanks instead of having the compressor on board(~5-6 lbs). If you just can't part with your compressor then consider taking a tank off(~1lbs). |
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
adjust your arm so your robot's starting posision is shorter than 48 inches.
therefore, your not breaking the rules. |
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
Our robot's name last year was Swiss Cheese.
=] A well deserved name That robot was a monster! To lose a lot of weight we drilled holes practically everywhere. Total number of holes: 1299 |
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
-Cheese the Bot
-Take off excess chain (large serpentine designs where a short, simple system will do = no good) -Calculate the weight before -Search CD for the other "weight loss" thread that's something like 20 pages long... lots of good information there. |
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
Use aluminum bolts instead of steel ones
All those little nuts and bolts can add up to a pound or two. (612 actually came in a pound under at both VCU and Chesapeake this year) |
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
You wouldn't believe it, this years robot for us came in about 2 to 3 pounds overweight. We eventually drilled holes in the ramp and came in around .2 pounds overweight. We actually had to remove the pink bolt that we place on the robot for one of our mentors. How in the world did we make it so precisely that to lower the weight we had to remove a bolt?!
After that it was about 119.9lbs. Strange year for us. |
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
Take off sensors you don't need. Last year, our two light sensors + cables were worth 0.5lbs.
Francois. |
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
Instead of drilling out the center of your bolts, just remove every other one. You don't really need six bolts there- just use three. Also, if you design your chassis to be a square, you'll end up putting a lot less stuff on your robot, since you won't have the space for it (and less stuff=less weight).
|
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
It is not hard to loose extreme amounts of weight. As my team would say, take ten pounds off of the programming.
|
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
We were over 6 pounds this year and be didn't scrap anything. We drilled holes for 8 hours though...
|
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
The best way to lose weight, is to have it not there in the first place.
Doing everything in CAD helps, but you have to understand that with every part you make, it needs to be strong enough. Anyone can make something very strong to accomplish a task. But making something very strong, and very light to accomplish the same thing...that is what engineering is my friends. Team 125 this year had a 4 ft. robot in the 120 lb weight class. We weighed in at 98.5 lbs. |
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
This year we were 30 pounds over weight and lost it by drilling and cutting out sections that we didn't need all day on Thursday.
 Our robot is the wooden one in the middle. |
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
At least your weight situation was pretty straightforward. During the build season this year we weighed all of the pieces on a scale that is +/- .5 lbs accurate, so we figured we could be off by up to a pound. Weight is also something we carefully consider in advance: The leadership has empowered both students and mentors with an anti cheese hole policy for our team.
We weighed it the systems together, it came up to 106 lbs (5ft robot). We added a bit of bolts and small integration mods, it went up to 112 lbs. Mind-boggling enough, we then added all of the wiring and went from 112 lbs to 108 lbs. 108 was also what our official weight at our first competition. There-in lies in incontravertible proof for the analogy that celery is to humans as wires are to a robot! |
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
A few days before ship, we swiss cheesed the entire chassis from 9:00PM on saturday to 1:30AM on sunday. Then right before the eliminations in milwaukee we weighed in at 110.0 lbs. :ahh:
|
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
Quote:
|
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
although your robot looses it's sturdyness (is that a word?), you could change the structure to a lighter wait material. for example, use plastic spur gears...
|
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
wow i just realized i made a lot of typos there...sorry
|
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
We always go over the bot with a dremel and cut off bolt heads and always make sure that there are no zip-tie ends still attached. If you have ramps, you can put some nice sized holes in the middle area.
|
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
At nationals, we came back from uncrating asking if we had any spare pneumatics cylinders. For..... brainstorming reasons.
|
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
Quote:
We've had robots that are full of cheese holes. These days we design them so that we don't have to add them. I think we were 119.8 or something pounds at competition. |
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
Look at these. This was our idea for losing weight. And all it did was help us!
http://hs.facebook.com/photo.php?pid...2&id=733515732 |
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
Last year was the only time we actually had a weight problem
In 2005 we were over 10 lbs under and threw a massive block of steel on the bottom of our robot to lower the CG and counterbalance the arm |
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
Structural integrity is not the only way that speed holes can come back to bite you. Today at Monty Madness, a team had some speed holes that were maybe 2" diameter drilled into the middle of their platform. The team that climbed onto them had omni wheels, and one of their rollers went down into the hole. This was the only part of the lifted robot that came in below 12", and the 15 points made the difference in the match.
|
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
Our holes were about 1.5" to 2" in diameter. We never had a problem because of the holes. Plus, we tapered them upward to give traction. It was very helpful.
|
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
Hi Storcky,
Your weight loss goal is very hard, I think to loose 6 pounds in 8 hours is difficult. But you have to work hard. Anyway I will suggest some advises are really helpful for your weight loss goal. Take minimum 5-6 meals instead of one big meal. Drink lots of plenty water on regular basis, because it will increases metabolism rate in our body and try to removing lots of fat contented food items (fast food). I suggest to take more grains and vegetables are very good for the health. One of the most powerful item to reduce heavy weight is chines green tea, you can take tea at least twice of the day then definitely get good result on losing more weight. If you have at least 30 minutes time in the morning, you can try to walking on regular basis, because it helps to burns more calories in our body and to practice more time with weightlifting. I hope while following these minimum tips are really good and you will get better improvement on losing weight. |
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
Quote:
|
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
Quote:
|
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
Quote:
|
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
I am soooo buying some for our robot! :D
|
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
Quote:
And I always joke about putting our robot on a diet... (Our robot was 10 lbs underweight for the first time ever this year... I guess my advice really did work.) |
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
our robot was so light we had to add weight to keep it from tipping over. i think we added about 40 pounds
|
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
If applicable take off chain drive and switch to transmission. Have two omnidirectional wheels in front and drive in back. =)
|
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
Quote:
|
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
well sand of any paint swiss chesse it and take of any extra stuff hallow out gears to make them lighter
|
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
For wrestling my friend had to lose 10lbs in an hour and a half and amazingly he did it.lol:D
|
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
This year the robot came in at the supermodel weight of 90lbs it was quite stunning (because this is our rookie year I don’t think we could handle the stress of being 30+ over)
|
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
Quote:
|
Re: How to lose 6 pounds in 8 hours
Quote:
I wonder if the Plastic-bag and lots of heavy clothing while exercising would work on a robot.... |
| All times are GMT -5. The time now is 04:16. |
Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.6.4
Copyright ©2000 - 2017, Jelsoft Enterprises Ltd.
Copyright © Chief Delphi