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Spockie-Tech
Site Admin
Joined: 31 May 2004
Posts: 3160
Location: Melbourne, Australia
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AFAIK Jason still wholesales IBC's to the Robot Market Place, so you can probably get them through there.. Im not certain though, I have only chatted with him briefly in the last few months and havent asked.
We never setup an easy to use Australian Retail Outlet/Website because the volume of sales in Australia was (and probably still is) Tiny comapared with overseas.
20 Million people in Oz, a fairly small percentage of builders since we never had mainstream TV coverage. 300 million people in the US alone, along with all their international customers and a fairly strong following with the mainstream media/sponsorship etc.. It was just never worth it.
I think he sold about 1 Australia Controller for every 50 or more overseas, which is why they are/were harder to get here than overseas. You had to email him or me, arrange postage/payment etc..
The lack of current limiting is probably its biggest lack these days, you need to be an intelligent user to get the most out of them without blowing them up..
I think Gary and I put hundreds of fights on them without a single failure, but it seemed people with dodgy wiring, crap batteries, no connectors, or little electrical knowledge were always blowing them up and obviously needed a more "user-friendly (or should that be idiot proof ? type of controller rather than the "simple and powerful but needs skill to use properly" design philosophy.
I dont think theres *still* anything comparable in terms of open-source, repairable, integrated (2drive+weapon+mixer), comapact and reasonably powerful.. but they are a 10 year old design now.. _________________ Great minds discuss ideas. Average minds discuss events. Small minds discuss people
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Sun Sep 25, 2011 3:11 pm |
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Glen
Experienced Roboteer
Joined: 16 Jun 2004
Posts: 9481
Location: Where you least expect
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MMMM well experience dictates it would probably be on a knife edge, every 4 motor featherweight in this country with an IBC has blown it so far (singularity, all the different KO's, other tims first wedge), the only one i can recall that has worked was the very first KO that had really low traction wheels as a kind of artificial current limit. That many motors is beyond its capacity if you want to make a bulletproof robot.
I cant recommend the Robot power sidewinder either. When it works, it works fantastic and the control is really amazing. BUT i've had two blow up. One was a manufacturing fault where a screw holding the heatsink temp sensor fell out and shorted the board and the other was an unexplained explosion basically. Kinda left with bitter feelings towards that controller considering its phenomenal cost (>$500), the UK guys have had a history of problems with them too.
IFI 883-885s though, not the smoothest control, the casings are weak as anything and they provide no other features aside from driving the motor, but seriously they are THE most reliable controller to date and i too would have no probs recommending them for what you want to do
Steves big brushless converted ESCs might be worth a look too. Not particularly battle tested so far but they are much cheaper then anything else and early results look pretty promising. You could probably use one controller per motor and still save some money over a brand name controller.
And the drives themselves, i'm looking at some magnums at the moment, they look pretty good and with the cost of drills going back up for whatever reason maybe not such a bad choice. Dewalts however will crap all over them and any other feather drive.
BUT everything is a compromise. They are heavy and physically large (1kg + per side vs 500g for a drill), they draw a TON of current. 2.2ah of battery capacity will just get you by for a fight and they need a beefy controller. But that being said they are super reliable. Cobra went FIVE YEARS on the same set of drives. i ended up replacing the brushes and bearings because they wore out from use. I cant recall that ever happening in any other robot ever
If you can afford them and you dont plan on having a weapon, then dewalts too get my thumbs up
Anyway theres some thoughts for you to digest lol, best of luck _________________ www.demon50s.com - Minimoto parts
http://www.youtube.com/user/HyzerGlen - Videoooozzz
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Mon Sep 26, 2011 1:41 pm |
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