Doombot
Repost :
@Everyone
I am designing a charging dock for my bot, and a lot of what @Rich said, I'm already doing in the background...I'm already in touch with a few great programmers willing to help - compensated of course. However I think we need to approach this problem from a different angle? If sensors or coding is so much work, why not do it from the engineering/mechanical perspective? I have a few ideas I'm drawing up, I will post this on the forum maybe we can all dissect it.
Here's one of them(rough sketch of course be kind):
I was thinking omni wheels going on the back of the bot, sideways, so all it needs to do is find the QR code or distance sensor, and the wheels would pretty much "force" the robot to go to the corner of the wall, where the charging leads could touch. we can do it to where the charging leads are hidden or have some cover on it, that will pop open (using the distance sensor) when the bot is within the vicinity. Any thoughts? This seems doable to me.
@Richard R You mean I can just use gyros to determine the position of my high powered motors? So I can just eliminate the pots and use the gyro to determine X,-X or Y,-Y? Theyre probably gonna be more accurate than a pot would they? I'm just thinking out loud here
Not to nit pick, but shouldn't the robot turn 180 and back in to the dock? A 360 and it would be going full circle. Also I wanted to ask, is the idea of this to charge a battery connected to an EZ-B or a separate battery?
@Steve G Haha you're correct bud. 180 degrees
I'm gonna be using 2 12v 9A batteries...the ones for kids electric cars...not a LiPo so it can be charged even while the system is running right? Please correct me if I'm wrong...
And please everyone, nitpick away! I'm here to learn so I don't have to live the (expensive) pains of trial and error
@Steve G Obviously you're not up to speed on North American usage of the compass...
@Doombot, yes, SLAs can be charged and used at the same time (think car or motorcycle battery). That is one reason I am going to be using them in my k9 (just haven't decided on 24v and wheelchair motors or 12v and Powerwheel motors. I'll post my own thread for help deciding. Pluses and minuses to both choices).
Alan
Lol, blame it on the beer giving me some clarity (doesn't happen often). I was thinking, that would be one dizzy robot
On a serious note though, this is something I'm very interested in for a future project. The one obstacle I see is yes, charging batteries while the EZ-B is still operational. An idea I had was a module that would plug in to the EZ-B's power socket with the battery connected to the other side of the module where the battery can be charged while the EZ-B is on, much like a cell phone or laptop. I think from what I understand, charging a LiPo battery while connected to an EZ-B is a no no, so does using other batteries like lead acid make a difference in this situation? confused
EDIT: I see Alan answered the question while I was writing. So why is it a LiPo cannot be charged while the EZ-B is still operational? It maybe a dumb question, but I really don't know.
@Steve G Yeah I thought so you can charge and use SLA batteries. I originally was gonna use a motorcycle battery...since I have those lying around...
I would have to look up the science behind it, but charging lipos while discharging them is one of the things that makes them get explody.
Alan