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Design and photos by Jerome Demers Sherbrooke, Quebec, Canada Jeromes instructions were modified by L2TT2L college mentors and staff based on building prototypes!
IMAGINE
What is the goal and problem being solved?
Learn about the design engineering process Get skills: soldering, glue gun, heat shrink, instructables, wiring, motors/switches Build community by having people work with those they do not know Have to be able to complete the project in 3 hours & work in teams
Explore
What have others done?
Researched many engineering design competition ideas on internet Researched many Instructables
Design
Which of the ideas is most promising?
We chose the Beetlebot v. 2 on instructables.
Beetlebot Materials
2 x 1.5V motors 2 x SPDT ( single pole double throw ) switches with a metal lever 2 x AAA battery 2 x Terminal connector 1 x AAA battery holder 1 x Plastic or wooden pearl (Spherical bead ) 1 x 1 inch x 3 inch piece of metal or aluminum 1 Toggle switch for the on/off switchs Paper clips big and small 2 feet of wires around 22/24 Gauge size Heat shrink that will fit over the motor shaft and over the terminal connector Electric tape and masking tape Items for the body shell : Round plastic lid to make the shell of the robot Spray can paint, the colour you want. 2 x Small magnets to attach shell to body. the recommended tools for this project: 1 x safety glasses!! 1 x soldering iron 1 x glue gun 1 x wire strippers 1 x scissors, knife, x-acto, etc
A B COM
Use hot glue gun to mount the two SPDT switches. The angle matters and will determine the responsiveness of your beetlebot! Antennas will be attached to the Swtich Levers
The legs of the beetlebot are the spinning shafts of the motors. Putting heat shrink on the motor shafts allows The bot to move around easier. Think of the heat shrink as the tire on a car. The car doesnt work well if you are driving on the rims --- you need tires to grip the road. Use a heat gun to shrink the heat shrink onto the ends of the motor shaft. These need to be very neat in order for the Beetlebot to move easily.
Cut a piece of metal approximately 1 x 3 : Meta l is Pretty easy to cut using Metal Scissors
Glue the metal plate to the FRONT of the Battery Holder. Placement of the Metal Plate is important so that the Beetlebot will not Tilt forward! Note that The angle of the Motor controls the Speed of the Bot! Tip: If you simply glue the metal plate to the holder, you will not be able to adjust it, so one solution is to put masking tape on both the metal plate and the battery holder, then glue the two pieces of masking tape together IF you need to adjust the motor placement to make the beetlebot move smoothly Later, then all you need to do is remove the masking tape!
Attaching a caster does 2 things: It makes the Bot able to move faster and It is used to prevent the Bot from tilting forward so the Bot can move more freely. Bend a large paper clip with needlenose plyers & slip on a wooden bead for making the caster roll. Making the leg of the caster longer helps prevent the tilt! Eventually you will Glue the caster to the Battery Holder. You may want to wait until the end to attach so you can position the caster so that the beetlebot will tip backwards. Use a Lot of glue to make it secure
It may help to tin the ends of the wire slightly before soldering the ends to the Second switch Legs!
(NOTE: photo shows a paperclip being used to make the connection, but it is better to use insulated wire)
The top two switch LEGS need to be soldered together. The topmost switch LEGs can be directly soldered. The Second switch Legs must be connected by a wire before being soldered.
Black tape is covering the metal plate, so that it photographs more easily. You dont have to do that!
A B COM
Connect the bottom of the two motors with a wire. You might want to use heat Shrink (NOT SHOWN) to strengthen the connection. It may help to tin the ends of the wires slightly before soldering!
Solder a wire TO THE Bottom of the Battery Holder. THIS IS VERY VERY VERY TRICKY. Be very careful when soldering to the battery holder, you can melt the battery holder! We found that it is safest to stick a bit of the wire through the battery holder and solder the INSIDE connection of the Battery holder rather than the outside! The new wire connects to the wire you soldered in step 9 between the motors! It may help to tin the wire ends before soldering! (You may want to make the connection to the motor temporarily with an alligator clip in the next step)
First, look at the wires coming out of your battery holder. One wire is + or Positive connection! One wire is or Ground/Earth connection! You may want use three alligator clips to test circuit before soldering. Tin the end of the Battery holder wires, then solder to the switch as shown! Test your Beetlebot:
Put batteries in it. (Alligator clip the third Battery holder connection to the motor for now!) Both motors should turn. By pressing the left switch the left motor should turn the other way. By pressing the right switch the right motor should turn the other way.
13. Antennas!
The antennas are the Sensors of the Beetlebot. Use Paperclips to shape the Antennas. Shape & Tilt of antenna Matters!!! Solder the paperclips to the antenna holder. If you want it to look pretty, put some larger diameter heat shrink over the connection.
Add a switch as shown to allow you to turn the Beetlebot on and off without removing the batteries! Putting heat shrink on before soldering to the legs will help aesthetics, but also keep your solder joints from shorting out in such a small space!
Unless you are VERY VERY LUCKY, Your Beetlebot will not work perfectly the First time! You will have to make some adjustments!
16. Troubleshooting
Antennas:
You can modify the angle and the curl of the antennas to make the Bot more responsive
Motors:
You can modify the position of the motors to make them more parallel and more balanced You can modify the heat shrink to make it more even You can change the position of the motor mount (easy if you used masking tape)