CATCHING SOME RAYS TO CHARGE UP.
gnarliest off-road terrain, especially after we replaced the
steering servo with a powerful Savox servo. The Rover could
climb rocks, careen down slopes, and plow through
obstacles as confidently as Bear Grylls after a delicious
snack of exotic fauna. However, all that impressive off-roading was done without a long arm hanging off of the
front of it. We were concerned that the weight of the
mechanism would take a lot of the springiness out of
the shocks, unbalance the Rover, and compromise the
turning radius.
All of those fears, however, were quickly dissipated
when we fired up the bot. It could handle rough terrain just
as easily as it ever could. The only thing we had to watch
out for was getting the bulky arm caught in obstacles, but
the killer Savox servo provided more than enough power to
allow the Rover to maneuver with ease.
With the Rover driving properly, the final test would be
to see if the arm and claw could actually pick up and
manipulate objects. We drove the Rover up to a suitable
rock and lowered the claw. Upon hitting the ground, the
claw began to open at a slow and contemplative pace
because of the gear ratio.
Once the claw was open, we edged the Rover closer to
our prospective sample until it looked to be within our
grasp. Reversing the direction on the joystick saw the claw
begin to close, and once it grasped the sample tightly, the
arm slowly ascended. Once the arm was at a suitable
height, we thought that a proper claw would have to pass
one last test: It would need to maintain its grip on the
sample as the Rover drove around. We started slowly at
first, but then made full speed turns, quickly changing
direction and swinging the Rover around. The sample
stayed firmly in the clenched claw, and we were thrilled
with the bot’s success.
Final Thoughts On Our Minds
Overall, we were very impressed with the expandability
of the 3-in-1 Lunar Rover kit from Minds-i. The extra parts
provided plenty of raw materials for a nice four bar linkage
Rock and Rover
LEAVING ITS MARK.
mechanism, and the kit meshed nicely with parts from
the VEX kit. The Rover was also amenable to switching
out the radios.
This project was done with only parts that we
happened to have on hand. With all of the expansion kits
offered by Minds-i — like the Arduino autonomous upgrade
kit and numerous sensors — the Lunar Rover kit is sure to
fire up a roboticist’s imagination and inspire them to shoot
much farther than the moon. SV
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SERVO 11.2012 73
