pic: 461's Drive Pod 2.6.2008

Beautiful.

[sdcantrell56]

That is beautiful. Whats the total weight as well as the thickness of aluminum? Also is that anodized or is it the hammered finish?

[roboticWanderor]

nice

[tdlrali]

The left chain looks very loose, but it looks like you guys already have a slot cut for attaching an idler/tensioner. Correct?

[Vikesrock]

Originally Posted by tdlrali

The left chain looks very loose, but it looks like you guys already have a slot cut for attaching an idler/tensioner. Correct?

You can actually see tensioners installed in the other two slots.

[ducttapedude]

Beautiful machining patters.

Definately like the black tread and black plates.

Those are some nice looking wheels as well.

And what is that other thing in the backround on the table?

[Nikhil Bajaj]

Originally Posted by sdcantrell56

That is beautiful. Whats the total weight as well as the thickness of aluminum? Also is that anodized or is it the hammered finish?

Thanks for the compliments, everyone! The total weight, with all of the wheels, chain, motors, etc. (everything) is give or take about 20+/-.5 pounds. Right now it is just spray-painted and then we were going to put a protective coat over it. We looked for a couple days but we couldn't really find anyone to do anodizing for us in town, we'll look harder before next year!

The chain IS loose there, since this picture was taken we added a half-link and stuck another tensioner in.

[Peter Matteson]

This looks vaguely familiar...

[Andy L]

Kind of resurrecting this post but how thick is the metal?

[Nikhil Bajaj]

Hi Andy,

The metal on the inner plate (the one that interfaces with the AndyMark gearbox) is 1/4". I wanted to make only the section interfacing with the gearbox 1/4" due to bearing clearances, and then the rest of it 3/16", but I also didn't want to plague our machinists, either. The outer plate is 3/16". The weight-reduction holes could have been more aggressive too, but yeah. The pod was designed before the season and we didn't really want to change it even after we found out the game, so the gear ratio was a little slower than it should have been for this year (it was designed for politely escorting, as the term is around here.)

If you have any other questions, let me know.

Nikhil

[Racer26]

The pod itself looks alot like 1075's in size and shape, but ours have a track instead of wheels, and our motors, gears, and shifting transmission are all housed inside the unit. 4 pins with clips and an electrical connector and a unit can be replaced with a spare.

At GTR we had a match with about a 30 minute turnaround, we broke both tracks. We had the spares on it, tested, working, ready to go, and we only missed the match because queueing falsely thought the match was underway and wouldn't let us in.

EDIT: and since the spares hadn't been used on the competition bot before, we had to drill all the holes for the bumper mounts in them, which took most of the time.

[ktbcantrell]

sweet looking drive tracks.

[Nikhil Bajaj]

Originally Posted by 1075guy

The pod itself looks alot like 1075's in size and shape, but ours have a track instead of wheels, and our motors, gears, and shifting transmission are all housed inside the unit. 4 pins with clips and an electrical connector and a unit can be replaced with a spare.

What do you mean by "housed inside the unit"?

[Racer26]

Essentially instead of driving the tracks drive wheels externally, the drive hub (two 'wheels' on either end of the units support the tracks [tracks made by brecoflex]). The driven 'wheel' is cut in half along its circumference, and a sprocket mounted inside it. This sprocket is driven by a custom chain (no joining link) to a smaller sprocket, which is mounted to a bevel gear. the other bevel gear is mounted to the output shaft of the transmission, and the input shaft of the transmission runs along the long axis of the unit. the input shaft is driven by two CIM's per side, mounted below the mainline shaft, connected by short chains. if you think of the track itself as being an oval, the wheels that drive it, the transmission, and the motors are all inside the oval, and only 4 pins actually interface with the main chassis of our robot, so changing out a broken drive doesnt involve replacing gears on motors, or any of that stuff, we just build spares, ship em with the robot, and an entirely new drivetrain could be put on in just minutes.