Here is another future requirement, as I wanted my robot to weather storms, being made of aluminum, stainless steel, and nylon, and after getting the electronics water-tight, the servos are the only vulnerability. Can any servo be converted to CR?
These little board's work great, this 5V step-up_step-down boost regulator kept my electronics running down to a battery voltage of 4 volts, I think it will work well for my purpose, as at 4 volts the servos are useless. I also have a 12V version on my FPV, and it gives me 90 minutes of camera opperation, and 400mw video-audio transmission from four alkalines or five rechargables. I am trying to get an idea of my runtime on a minimal battery configuration, so when I load the bot with a full compliment of batterys, I'll have a better knowledge of whether to run the two six volt bank's in parallel, the extra torque isn't neessisary but the speed increase would be desirable. Or automatically switch between the two, when one drops to low. It would be nice to combine them again, when both are too low to be useful singularly, may get it home.
Thank You xanadu, I will probably be asking you for lighting advice down the line, I want to write something across the yard sometime.
I hadn't forgot about posting an outdoor video, and I will get that done soon. Got sidetracked as usual. I was close to coming up with something, and then I happened to witness the vehicle involved in a daytime burglary at the house across the road. After meeting with a Sheriff Detective a couple of times to relate what I had seen, and look at some photos of vehicles. The wife and I kinda kept a low profile all summer. Seems they had stolen some guns, and I dont trust the neighbor as far as I could throw him anyway. He had came to the back door a couple of times to conduct his own investigation, after reportng him to the Sheriff for trespassing, he was warned not to bother us anymore. It has been an ongoing thing with renters and the property owner. And the man who rents the house across the road had been taken to court by us about seven years ago, he can afford to tie up the system, but he did get a warning not to let his renters affect are lives. So things have been quiet all summer, even a Harley-Davidson comes and goes without to much notice.
Back on subject: I am in the middle of getting TEMPER's electronics on a permanent home, and getting the boards on a new mounting. As soon as I get the new platform attached and secure a good camera mount, I will post a video of my progress.
I wanted to post a shot of the new diggs, before installing the six battery holders, thats twenty AAs! The control platform (Top) is attached with one screw, two stainless steel pins position and stabilize it to the support. Will make it fairly easy remove in case I'm not able to change battery's without. Going to like all the new real estate, I struggled for a long time on what material to use and settled for wood, it may not be very stylish, but I think I can box it in with aluminum and make it functional, dust and weather resistant hopefully.
erco and Jim,
Most of that full complement of batteries will be rechargeable, I have some dummy batteries to fill in spaces when I use alkaline.
Got to make a trip to HW store to buy the appropriate fasteners to mount the holders.
Ran into a small tire rub problem on the front in an extreme turn either direction. The solution Is to trim a little off the lower platform, or to raise both platforms off the frame. The former won't effect real estate but will make it a little harder to enclose. The latter will effect the profile. Camera, radio, ping and PIR will be the top most objects mounted. So in trying to keep a low profile, that option is less desirable.
I need another reason to go to town, the wife thinks acquiring parts for this is not a legitimate excuse.
The platforms turned out to compliment the looks, IMO. Touch up turned out less than desirable. After drilling some more holes for board mounting and wire routing, it will get a repaint this winter, probably battleship grey.
EDIT: as soon as I get to the hardware store and can mount FPV, I will get an outdoor video put together, nothing is more wild than my yard right now.
Made a trip to the HW store this morning, I knew after trimming the platforms that the small battery holders would protrude out over the front of the vehicle. After repositioning the holders inboard and back a little, the whole business can be enclosed without to much hassle. I have some rewiring to do, luckily the battery holder move left prime area for a single power switch and circuit protection.
Just a quick update to let anyone interested know I am making progress one step at a time. I wanted to get past the hardware stage and concentrate on the fun part, coding. After an eight hour solder session on the control board, my brain is numb with the fumes. But my robots brain has a heartbeat, and checks out OK, no shorts. I am going to get some of the main sensors and radio wired up tomorrow, hope I have as good of luck planning space as I have had so far.
Four sensors down, and a few to go on this board. Have some trouble with the code on the altimeter-barometer but the other modules are working good. Working on an adapter board for my RXM-GPS, a vertical socket to mount the GPS horizontally over the accelerometer, temp-humidity and altim-barometer sensors. Trying to get as much as I can in a small space. Power from the supply will be introduced to the top board, and feed the Propeller below from there. I still need to get an LLC mounted. to drive the PSCU, and a transistor driver to switch the GPS to constant nav. Ping, PIR, XBee and a couple of other sensors like rain, sound and geophone will be mounted off board in separate locations. Still thinking how to encorporate an annemometor and wind direction on a small scale into my design. A hack on this hand held would be a good start.
After making two adapter boards boards, the first wasn't quite high enough to facilitate installation and removal of the Memsic 2125, I now have global positioning.
I was thinking of another GPS when I thought It needed logic conversion to change from static navigation to constant. This one is a 5V module with CMOS compatable communication. The adapter serves two purposes, helping to isolate the compass module.
It's looking like I will be able to get a lot of the electronics in one small package. My next step is mounting the LLC, since I am only using one forth of it, and no foreseeable use for any other conversion, may just go with a transistor circuit. But the the option of having an LLC already in place may be better, decisions desisions.
Well anyway it's all working out pretty good, without doing any extensive planning. This is very soon to be mounted on the robot, so I can get down to more important things, PLAYTIME.
Looking good, boss! How long until that beast be rolling?
Thanks erco, One of my main problems is finding hardware to mount these proto boards. They put awful small mounting holes on these, no room to drill out to a larger diameter, or I would take the whole corner off the board. The hardware store in town has nothing that small in SS or anything else. I have scoured my collection of take-offs, and can't put four or eight matching screws together.
I was looking for a pic of my pile of small fasteners, and I accidentally submitted the last post. I still need to mount my radio's and solve some other incidentals. But I am getting close.
BTW: Here's a look at the aluminum bead lock rims, they are inside and outside of the wheels. that was more hardware that had me stumped. Till I figured out it was SS hardware that was supplied.
Mounted the control circuit vertically for the PSCU, it saves board space and is essentially boxing in the temperature and humidity sensor, so as to keep track of core conditions. Another SHT-11 will be used for outside conditions.
An example of how sensitive the compass module is, the small speakers pictured were over a foot away from the sensor, and effected it's readings, I incorporated stereo output as shown by the piezo element. I want amplified stereo sound, so I will have to isolate the speakers somehow. Or find speakers better suited for the job. The vertical set-up of the boards lwill make it easy to add the TLS230 light sensor, and the WS2812B RGB LED for visual feedback.
As of now I will have four modules on I2C comunication, not counting EPROM. With a proposed second SHT-11 and SD card will bring that to six. I am going to need a better understanding of how that protocol works, and see how many items I can get on one bus. Maybe if someone has a suggestion, I am definitely open to help.
As far as mounting these boards on the chassis, I may go with stainless steel pins and a strap to hold it down. Not crazy about that idea. All I really nead to do is is mount the main board ( the one with the Propeller), and then all I have to do to make any circuit changes is just unplug the sensor board. With the ample headers in place, it's not going anywhere. Going to work on that next, and also secure the compass, alt-bar and GPS that are dangling from their headers. They wouldn't pass a vibration test as they are now.
After creating a backplane that serves a few purposes, I had to mod the GPS a little, like trim some off the edge of the board, and round off the antenna connector. Also I pulled the USB connector off, and will probably remove the FTDI chip, as there is no need to feed un-necessary electronics. The new board supports the GPS and altimeter-barometer board, Plus gives me a good area to mount my XBee vertically on the back. I am going with SS pins to mount the boards on the chassis, that will make it real easy to remove and install. I am going to come up with a horizontal top board that plugs in, to accommodate light to frequency chip, and RGB LED. I still have left plenty of room for future additions.
I managed to get my DS-1302 module incorporated inside and behind what will be another panel that will plug in to cover the side, and give me some more space for future changes. Also mounted the XBee on the back, worst case conditions hopefully I just bend the antenna back or knock it out of its socket going under low overhead space.
Comments
Anyway, we got a whole new road, and that was a mess of dust, so I have to catch-up on yard work. Nothing much growing here but weeds and corn.
These have incredible spec's, and speed is just .020/60 deg. slower than the ones I have, wow is that a RPM ?
But one thing I would gain is noise, these are quiet, not like a MG servo, got to sneak up on the critters.
BO though, I didn't go any farther to find out.
http://hitecrcd.com/products/servos/waterproof-servos-2/hs-646wp-high-voltage-high-torque-analog-waterproof-servo/product
I've never used the stuff myself but the video looked reasonably convincing.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Search?search=watertightness&go=Go
It's my new byword.
Can't see Duane's video, just white.
Thank You xanadu, I will probably be asking you for lighting advice down the line, I want to write something across the yard sometime.
I hadn't forgot about posting an outdoor video, and I will get that done soon. Got sidetracked as usual. I was close to coming up with something, and then I happened to witness the vehicle involved in a daytime burglary at the house across the road. After meeting with a Sheriff Detective a couple of times to relate what I had seen, and look at some photos of vehicles. The wife and I kinda kept a low profile all summer. Seems they had stolen some guns, and I dont trust the neighbor as far as I could throw him anyway. He had came to the back door a couple of times to conduct his own investigation, after reportng him to the Sheriff for trespassing, he was warned not to bother us anymore. It has been an ongoing thing with renters and the property owner. And the man who rents the house across the road had been taken to court by us about seven years ago, he can afford to tie up the system, but he did get a warning not to let his renters affect are lives. So things have been quiet all summer, even a Harley-Davidson comes and goes without to much notice.
Back on subject: I am in the middle of getting TEMPER's electronics on a permanent home, and getting the boards on a new mounting. As soon as I get the new platform attached and secure a good camera mount, I will post a video of my progress.
Mike Y.
Jim
erco and Jim,
Most of that full complement of batteries will be rechargeable, I have some dummy batteries to fill in spaces when I use alkaline.
Got to make a trip to HW store to buy the appropriate fasteners to mount the holders.
Ran into a small tire rub problem on the front in an extreme turn either direction. The solution Is to trim a little off the lower platform, or to raise both platforms off the frame. The former won't effect real estate but will make it a little harder to enclose. The latter will effect the profile. Camera, radio, ping and PIR will be the top most objects mounted. So in trying to keep a low profile, that option is less desirable.
I need another reason to go to town, the wife thinks acquiring parts for this is not a legitimate excuse.
EDIT: as soon as I get to the hardware store and can mount FPV, I will get an outdoor video put together, nothing is more wild than my yard right now.
Just a quick update to let anyone interested know I am making progress one step at a time. I wanted to get past the hardware stage and concentrate on the fun part, coding. After an eight hour solder session on the control board, my brain is numb with the fumes. But my robots brain has a heartbeat, and checks out OK, no shorts. I am going to get some of the main sensors and radio wired up tomorrow, hope I have as good of luck planning space as I have had so far.
Bye bye breadboards!
Mike Y.
I was thinking of another GPS when I thought It needed logic conversion to change from static navigation to constant. This one is a 5V module with CMOS compatable communication. The adapter serves two purposes, helping to isolate the compass module.
It's looking like I will be able to get a lot of the electronics in one small package. My next step is mounting the LLC, since I am only using one forth of it, and no foreseeable use for any other conversion, may just go with a transistor circuit. But the the option of having an LLC already in place may be better, decisions desisions.
Well anyway it's all working out pretty good, without doing any extensive planning. This is very soon to be mounted on the robot, so I can get down to more important things, PLAYTIME.
Looking good, boss! How long until that beast be rolling?
Thanks erco, One of my main problems is finding hardware to mount these proto boards. They put awful small mounting holes on these, no room to drill out to a larger diameter, or I would take the whole corner off the board. The hardware store in town has nothing that small in SS or anything else. I have scoured my collection of take-offs, and can't put four or eight matching screws together.
An example of how sensitive the compass module is, the small speakers pictured were over a foot away from the sensor, and effected it's readings, I incorporated stereo output as shown by the piezo element. I want amplified stereo sound, so I will have to isolate the speakers somehow. Or find speakers better suited for the job. The vertical set-up of the boards lwill make it easy to add the TLS230 light sensor, and the WS2812B RGB LED for visual feedback.
As of now I will have four modules on I2C comunication, not counting EPROM. With a proposed second SHT-11 and SD card will bring that to six. I am going to need a better understanding of how that protocol works, and see how many items I can get on one bus. Maybe if someone has a suggestion, I am definitely open to help.
As far as mounting these boards on the chassis, I may go with stainless steel pins and a strap to hold it down. Not crazy about that idea. All I really nead to do is is mount the main board ( the one with the Propeller), and then all I have to do to make any circuit changes is just unplug the sensor board. With the ample headers in place, it's not going anywhere. Going to work on that next, and also secure the compass, alt-bar and GPS that are dangling from their headers. They wouldn't pass a vibration test as they are now.
Mike Y.