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Subject: 
Re: How much weight can a LEGO chassis carry around?
Newsgroups: 
lugnet.robotics
Date: 
Sat, 10 Dec 2005 14:41:37 GMT
Original-From: 
dan miller <DANBMIL99@YAHOO.COMstopspam>
Viewed: 
1600 times
  
Apologies if this double-posts, Yahoo is in a mood.

I solved your problem by purchasing the lightest laptop I could find, a Sony
ultralight (PGC 161L, $800 on ebay).  It's a hair over 2 lbs, and I've used
it on a couple projects:

http://www.danbmil.com/lego/

It has a built-in camera, which is very cool.  The last 'bot in these pix
could locate a bottle (with a pattern of stripes taped on it), go to it,
pick up the bottle and bring it back to me (sort of..)  It was definitely
pushing the limit on Lego load-bearing capacity.  Note the omniwheel casters
from Charmed Labs.  (the laptop sat right behind the RCX's, with the top
flipped up and the camera, which is on this little swivel, pointing
forward).

As for doing it with a regular-sized laptop (6-8 lbs), I think your best bet
would be the trailer, but it just might be too big.  Two sets of double
wheels each, right near the center of gravity, with a caster cantilevered
out (so it doesn't bear much weight) could do the trick.  Or pick up the
Omniwheels, they're pretty cool.

-dbm


ps I recently started a platform that uses three Lacrosse balls in little
cages as the wheels.  Will post when I get around to it.


--- steve <sjbaker1@airmail.net> wrote:

Joe Strout wrote:
In lugnet.robotics, Nathan Colyer <ncoly1@eq.edu.au> wrote:

It might work to make a robot that tows the laptop on a trailer setup?

I don't see how that solves any problems.

Ah, sort of the 18-wheeler approach to carrying heavy loads.  That's not • a bad
idea; certainly it solves the axle-support and skid-steering problems.

How?  The trailer still has to have a bunch of axles in order to spread
the weight - and when you do that, the trailer is (in effect)
skid-steering.

But it
makes the steering code a much harder problem, doesn't it?  I can • imagine my
poor bot getting stuck in a dead-end hallway, having a hard time turning • itself
around.

That's the cool thing about using a synchro platform - the robot can
drive in any direction it wants without turning around (in fact, it
*can't* turn around).  But it is the ultimate in manouverability.




Message has 1 Reply:
  Re: How much weight can a LEGO chassis carry around?
 
Dan, I remember seeing this robot. I didn't remember that you built it, but its impressive. OT Comment: Can't use $ony products anymore though I think you underestimate the ability of Lego for strength. Construction techniques make it possible to (...) (19 years ago, 10-Dec-05, to lugnet.robotics)

Message is in Reply To:
  Re: How much weight can a LEGO chassis carry around?
 
(...) I don't see how that solves any problems. (...) How? The trailer still has to have a bunch of axles in order to spread the weight - and when you do that, the trailer is (in effect) skid-steering. (...) That's the cool thing about using a (...) (19 years ago, 9-Dec-05, to lugnet.robotics)

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