Frequenzberater

Thx! I think I need to share some background: My wife got me this module from a second hand market as a birthday present. It was completly assembled but not running. So I dissambled it and cleaned the parts in order to build it completly new by keeping it as frictionless as I could. I also exchanged some axles to straight ones and some other parts to a better suiting color. What I have not dissambled is the big circle part and the "chain ring" because I am lazy and I hate repetitive building steps :D All in all it was not that hard to build. Most challenging was to get the stepper running smoothly with low friction, and to bring the assembled "chain ring" in place. In addition, special attention is required by assembling the drive train right behind the XL motor. It can cause a lot of resistance if not aligned correctly. But there is nothing which an experienced GBC builder should be afraid of.

Finally found some time to build a classic

Thank you very much for guiding me through this! I already replaced all "miscolored" parts and Iam really happy with the result. Now I finally have a free mind for other non Lego related projects again :D

I finally got it! After building the emptier back to original design I noticed a mistake I made earlier. I accidently placed two of the yellow panels which are supposed to grab the bucket not as shown in the instructions: but facing to each other. That Was the reason why the buckets were hold so "wobbly". After correcting the panels the module works like a charm: Last thing I need to do is to exchange the elastic band of the ball picker. As you can see, it still drops some balls occasionally. But I am happy how it works now!

After some more tweaking and adjusting, the module finally runs not that bad. During several test runs, I observed two issues which I need to take care of: 1. The combination of the bucket slider and emptier still doesn't work reliable. I already tried slightly changing the timing but without success. In addition I modified the lower grabbing part a bit (more details at the end of this post) which brought some improvements, but not fully eliminated the problems. This malfunction occurs approximatly one time in three minutes. Here is a short video showing the moment when it jams: 2. Occasionally the ball picker doesn't pick up the right ball properly and drops it midway. I am not sure yet what causes this. Maybe the amplitude of the stamps is to low, or maybe its just a simple timing issue. Here is a video of a good working five minute run,where you can see the ball dropping at 01:45 : Finally some pics of my modified bucket emptier: As you can see, I raised the yellow 1x4 panel at the back of the lower grabber by one plate, because I had the feeling, that the buckets were placed back too close to the grey panels on the table behind. In addition I replaced the other yellow 1x4 panel (frontside of lower grabber) by a tile, because the balls were not dumped out reliable because the edge of the panel was often blocking it.

After I took the video, I had still experienced some jamming with the spiral lift. So I modified it again and it seem to work. I have just one picture, but tomorrow I could provide more details: I am also interested in your modification. So it would be great if you could share some details.

Thx mate, for your helpfull advices and constantly trying to keep me motivated :D I really appreciate that. I think Its almost done. Full cicle including two balls per bucket has worked flawlessly for a few minutes recently. But when I switched to the ball feedback path, I experienced some blockings and jamming within my spiral lift. But I am confident to find a solution this evening. The light is near :)

That thing looks like something straight from a Sonic game, build by Dr. Eggman Great work!

Yesterday, I was able to get a full bucket cicle running flawlessly for over a minute. I replaced the connector of the lifter as suggested and it improved the situation a bit, but the bucket emptier is still causing trouble. Main problem is, that the buckets were grabbed in a tilted position, as you can see in the video. Up to know, I have no Idea how to avoid that. Slight adjustments of the shifter timing, had no effect to it. Yes, the bucket lifter could need a half stud longer amplitude. But I have no idea how to achive that, because the lever would need a lenght of 4,5L for that. In that case the connector would just be placed on a half lenght of the cross axle, what is not good in my opinion: How did you achived the 4,5L? Bob is running fine now. It just needed to be lifted up for 1mm to provide some clearance between the bottom of buckets and the wheel. Edit: To add another point, occasionally I experience some issues with this guide structure: Sometimes, when a bucket has reached the end and is blocked by the shifter, waiting to get moved to the sliding table, it gets lifted by the conveyor underneath somehow, tilts over and get stuck in between. Until now, I have no idea how to avoid that. I tried several guiding designs but without succes so far.

I got the bucket cicle working more or less. But there are two main issues with it so far: 1. The buckets are not grabbed properly "straight" by the emptier. As a result, the buckets were not put back correctly aligned which sometimes causes blockings. (Can be seen at the end of the video) 2. Sometines Bob fails to put the bucket back on the wheel properly and the bucket falls down. I need to investigate the root cause of this issues now, but currently I have no clue, because the timing seems correct to me.

Good catch! I didnt even noticed it yet. But I found out, that the yellow 4L tilting lever of the bucket emptier slightly collides with the exit switch ramp when it is switched to the right and the lever is in a lower position. That also causes some stress. Have you had the same issue in your build?

Thx! Glad to be able to give at least a bit back :)

Short update from my side: From a mechanical point of view everything ist complete and runs fine. During the building process I modified a few areas mainly in regards of rigidity and axle supports. As soon the module is finalized I can provide more details if anyone is interested. Next phase is the required fine tuning of the timing between all components. Currently I am thinking about the most logical order. Spiral lift / Ball pusher / Ball picker works already fine. I think as the next step, I will set the timing of the wheel and use it as a reference for the timing of bob and bucket shifter. When everything is working properly, I am going to place a last order to exchange some parts to better suiting colors :)

Heres a picture of the assembly of the center structure:

I have ordered a proper amount of parts to implement all modifications and beeing able to fiddling around a bit. Should have arrived all by the end of the week. In the meantime I have seperated the Spiral lift and Ball picker section from the rest of the module in order to bring in the timing differential and to work out a most frictionless operation. In addition I redesigned the sled of the bucketlifter again. Functionality has to be proven in operation yet.