n8walker

Alright, I will give it a try, I can still swap back to the current scheme once the contest pictures are taken. Thank you for the input.

Nice! I like the idea of the docking system. This is really clever. The height adjustment looks cool as well. The base movement looks a little bit halting. Is this due to the high mass and resistance of the many gears necessary or might it be, that there are misaligned cardan joints somewhere? This is no criticism, models of that size are always difficult to motorize, and you need a lot of gears which have a lot of friction.

I really like your walking mechanism, I think I am going to copy it and try it myself. Do you think, it would be possible to use it without the worm gears in a smaller moc or does this kind of movement lead to a lot of resistance which has to be geared down so much? Best Regards

In my opinion, part of the contest is to search for interesting concepts that might be useful, even if they are unconventional. Otherwise everybody would just create a tracked vehicle which - I agree - is the most useful on snow. But maybe this concept has some benefits as well. For example, it can not tip over.

Hello everybody, I am finished with my entry but I did not have time yet to post any WIP content. Nevertheless I took some pictures during building, so I can show you my design process now: The CRAB - ROV - Camouflage Robot for Arctic Biotopes - Remote Operated Vehicle The idea was to build a sideways walking robot with an appearance like a crab. The leg kinematic is based on the Klann linkage: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Klann_linkage This kinematic is actually used in some underwater walking robots right now, so I thought it to be reasonable to use it in some arctic vehicle. At first I created a test vehicle with 8 legs: Crab robot WIP 2 by n8walker23, auf Flickr Crab robot WIP 1 by n8walker23, auf Flickr This proof of concept went fine, the legs can easily move, rotate and lift the vehicle. The gearing down of the drive motors is not even necessary. The next task was to shrink that mechanism, as a smaller vehicle would be even more efficient at moving as fast as possible without straining the linkage or overloading the motors. A kinematic for the claws had to be designed as well. My layout would be: one motor for back four legs, one motor for front four legs, and one motor for each claw. So this was the next stage: Crab robot WIP 3 by n8walker23, auf Flickr Crab robot WIP 4 by n8walker23, auf Flickr The motion of the sensors (the eyes) is coupled to the motion of the claws and it has some simple bodywork. The eye motion can cover an area of roughly 45 degrees. This design was followed by the next optimization loop: Crab robot WIP 5 by n8walker23, auf Flickr Crab robot WIP 6 by n8walker23, auf Flickr I am quite happy with the bodywork at this stage. The rear propellers are driven simultaneous with the rear legs and the front legs are connected to a two-cylinder fake engine. The weight of the robot was 787g. Roughly 350g of that are the electronic parts. Now it was time to streamline the construction, decrease part count and weight and improve building quality. At the next iterations the robot would be modular. This made it much easier to apply little modifications, as it is not necessary any more to disassemble everything all the time to get access to critical regions. Also, I replaced the fake engine by a fan, as i found a combustion engine not really fitting to the concept. Crab robot WIP 7 by n8walker23, auf Flickr Crab robot WIP 8 by n8walker23, auf Flickr Crab robot WIP 9 by n8walker23, auf Flickr Crab robot WIP 10 by n8walker23, auf Flickr This is the final stage of the robot. Weight is reduced to 738g. Now I need to do some programming to have a nice remote control and to get good pictures and maybe a video as well. Regarding the colour scheme, I tried some variants, but some choices are already set by the colours of the mindstorms parts: Crab robot WIP 11 by n8walker23, auf Flickr I think (e) is looking the cleanest, so this scheme is applied right now. Most fitting to the contest would be (d) i guess, with mostly white and yellow. But I think it is a good idea to use the turquoise of the mindstorms box somewhere else in the model so the box does not stand out too much. This leads to a solution like (b), but I think, that is too colorful. What are your thoughts on that?

You are right, there are several approaches, and hydraulic drives get used as well, but mechanical solutions have less energy loss, so they get used in fast travelling vehicles. This is, what I used: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Differential_steering#/media/File%3ADifferential_steering_mechanism.png I agree, with a worm gear the selector should be controllable. Maybe you can even have a little indicator on the outside, to see, which function is engaged.

Nice project, turns out to have a lot of high tech solutions, which I really like. Cool, that you use a subtractor drive, which is far more realistic. I used it in some of my tank mocs as well and in my opinion the steering feels much more realistic this way. And if you add a fake engine, it is running properly. I am going with wave selectors as well for my entry (nothing posted yet) to overcome the 4 motors limitation. How are you going to make sure to rotate 90 degrees? I am going to use the mind storms parts so I can program it that way. Greetings

Thank you! It was quite a challenge to hide the mechanism within a reasonable height and to keep the not rectangular setup, but I had a lot of fun doing so...

02 - 1 point 14 - 1 point 18 - 1 point

01 - 1 point 07 - 1 point 12 - 1 point

03 - 1 point 12 - 1 point 13 - 1 point

Thank you very much!

Hello everybody, here is my entry to the contest, a swamp temple. Please let me know whether there are any issues... Good luck to all!

While Johnny is on an adventure elsewhere, Gail Storm gathered her team to inspect a jungle temple located in a swampy bamboo-forest. It seems to be holding some treasure, but will she be able to unlock the gate mechanism? The built contains a working lock mechanism with four locks which have to be rotatet to the correct position. Once this is done, the doors can be opened remotely by a central handle. Adventure_a by n8walker23, auf Flickr Adventure_b by n8walker23, auf Flickr Adventure_c by n8walker23, auf Flickr Adventure_d by n8walker23, auf Flickr Adventure_e by n8walker23, auf Flickr Adventure_f by n8walker23, auf Flickr Adventure_g by n8walker23, auf Flickr

Thank you very much for this contest. There are so many great entries, I guess, it must be really hard to judge them all! I couldn't even guess, which entries would win. Apart from thomas_jenkins_bricks' probably, which are absolutely stunning.

Thank you! Yes, I went through some design iterations until I liked the result. Actually there are a lot of technic frames and beams in the base, which connect everything quite rigid. So it is not as fragile as it looks and could be even turned upside down, without losing (too many) parts.

I really like it! It has a pretty good alien-planet feeling. It's a nice variety from the 'standard' rocky surface. Probably building a black background for the holes would make the holes look deeper?

Nice design and cool idea to have an ejector seat. Though I personally wouldn't like to be ejected (and probably lost) during spaceflight...

Thank you!

Thank you, everybody

Thank you very much!

Thank you very much. It was done with two rows of the five studs wide technic tracks as support.

Hello everybody, here are my entries for the contest: It was an interesting challenge and made me think out of the box. I am usually more of a technic/cars guy... So thank you for this contest and please let me know, if there are any problems with my entries.

Hello everybody, this is my entry for the nature is after you category. Three clones are stationed on a speeder refueling platform on some remote jungle planet. One of them managed to trip an fall over the edge of the platform and right into the mouth of a huge carnivorous plant. Will the other two be able to rescue him? As soon as I read about the 'nature is after you' idea, the rubber tail from Set Nr. 4094 came to my mind, so I based my entry on a plant with this tail as a tongue. Nature 1 by n8walker23, auf Flickr Nature 2 by n8walker23, auf Flickr Nature 3 by n8walker23, auf Flickr Nature 4 by n8walker23, auf Flickr

Hello, this is my entry for Rogue Clone. It is a stormtrooper which should be serving in the imperial forces, but he is fleeing instead. He managed to dive into a pool right before a Scout-Trooper on a speeder bike arrived on the scene. I wanted a transparent water-surface, so the biggest window part in my collection restricted the size of this creation, but I think, the effect was worth it. Rogue Clone 1 by n8walker23, auf Flickr Rogue Clone 2 by n8walker23, auf Flickr Rogue Clone 3 by n8walker23, auf Flickr Rogue Clone 4 by n8walker23, auf Flickr Rogue Clone 5 by n8walker23, auf Flickr