Elevator Attachment

 At least one challenge requires manipulation of items, a two axis elevator is to be used as attachment.

Step 1 - Elevator Assembly, Motors and Gears

For the hardware, a through search on the 'mistery boxes' found an elevator of unknown origin. The first step in the assembly was finding two DC motors and two worm gears laying around that fit the assembly.

  Illustration 1 - Elevator Assembly, Motors and Gears

Step 2 - Test Elevator

The elevator was tested on the bench using a 5V supply line. Both elevation and gripper works as intended.

  Illustration 2 - Elevator Test

Step 3 - Hardpoints

Hull hardpoints are drilled on the robotic platform and the elevator is measured to stay within the size limit for the Pi Wars. Total length is just shy of the 400mm limit.

 

   Illustration 3 - Mount attachment and check for limits

Step 4 - Software and Firmware

Now bindings for keyboard controls needs to be added to the html page hosted inside the raspberry pi, the bindings needs to be linked to the node.js server to receive the keystroke from the browser and emit a serial port message to the motor board and finally the board firmware needs to be updated to use the motor channel 2 and 3 to control elevation and gripper. Channel 2 is shared with the main weapon.

Elevator keys:

•  'T' = UP
• 'G' = DOWN
• 'F' = CLOSE
• 'H' = OPEN

 

   Illustration 4 - Firmware Update

Conclusions

This entry has detailed the construction of the elevator attachment for OrangeBot.