Team 47... Alchemists...

[Joe Johnson]

I don't have any real pictures of our robot, (look for that soon -- hopefully no later than Monday March 1).

I will say this much now that the build is over: Our machine uses 8 Dewalt XRP transmissions. The engineers at Dewalt really know there stuff.



In my opinion, the XRP drill is head and shoulders the best cordless drill I have seen out there. There are a few very useful features of this drill trans.

1. First of all, it has a 3 speed transmission (47 to 1, 16 to 1, and 12 to 1).
2. The shifter is designed such that a servo can easily and reliably shift it with parts you can make using a band saw, drill press and pliers.
3. The output shaft is 1/2 inch (easy to interface to) AND it is designed to take a side load -- notice the handle on the picture -- this baby is intended for a 300 pound construction worker to be able to "lean into it"
4. Because it is designed for a clamp on handle, a simple standard aluminum clamp collar is all you need to hold this drill in place (1 11/16" ID available from McMaster.com)
5. All metal gears and lots of them.
6. Built in torque limiting feature -- no worries about impact loading breaking your gears or you arm or whatever.
7. Oh yeah, if you lift with one, you can leave the anti-backdrive pins in and viola! you don't fall when power is removed.

All this and it cost less and is lighter than any similar transmission I have ever designed for FIRST.

It has all this and a lot of other great things going for it, the only problem is that the motors are not legal for FIRST.


But fear not... ...we were able to interface the Chiaphua, Bosch, Fisher Price, Globe and Keyang motors to this transmission!

We will see how it turns out, but so far, we are very happy with the results.

Stop by our pits in Detroit, San Jose or Atlanta. We plan on having a display showing how we performed this alchemy.

Joe J.