Model 1: Trix:
This is a sailboat, boat itself is about 70 years old, roughly 3 feet long, 5 feet tall with sail.
It has a hatch in centre that allows access to an internal handle.
I designed an insert to take the control mechanisms, 2 servos, a simple 9g servo to control steering and a winch servo to control sails.
Model 2: Buggy:
This is a remote control beach buggy, should look like the beach buggy my father designed and built back in the 70s.
Trix had been taken down to basic shell and coated with resin to make it waterproof, so before I could start in earnest I had to prepare and paint it, so I tended to concentrate on the Buggy whilst spraying the coats of paint on Trix in background
This is the basic Trix shell, now painted white, I need to put back all the fittings, get the electronics working then float so I can get the water line before I can paint the red underside.
This is with the electronics module fitted.
This is the electronics module, 3D printed out of red PLA, sprayed white to match Trix. The top small box clips off to allow changing of batteries in situ. It holds 4 off standard AAA batteries.
2 nylon cords are routed through PTFE tubes from correct position on deck (for sails) to winch servo.
Power switch on top, small 9g servo for connecting to rudder.
Buggy is a fully printed new design from scratch.
Top is a photo of me in my fathers original Beach Buggy, note it's a banana, yellow with brown patches, 4 banana linked for steering wheel, green banana leaf bucket seats.
Middle is a photo of current printed model.
Bottom is a picture export from OpenSCAD.
No body (yet, half designed).
I'm really happy with the tyres, they are Oogoo set in PLA printed moulds.
Oogoo 1:1 cornflour:silicon with black printer ink added, nice rubbery texture, grip well.
The steering was surprisingly easy. The floorpan in accurately based upon the VW Beetle chassis with 12" removed as used in any full sized beach buggy. The motor is a standard MR2. I had lots of problems with the gear box, I could not get the standard OpenSCAD gear library to create gears small enough, so I used my old involute gear library I created for my failed clock. Currently 10:1 using 4 gears.
Trix is basically simple, control modules, 4 AAA batteries, 2 standard servos, but it's not something I can publish, I doubt anyone else has a boat like Trix.
Buggy is more complex but publishable, once complete I can publish to Thingiverse and anyone can build it. It has control module, 1 standard servo, 1 standard ESC, motor and gears.
Everything works on the bench. Connected up to bench PSU it all runs perfectly. As soon as I try to get it to work for real then it goes nuts. To start with I had 4 off AAA in the buggy, batteries all in series (4 x 1.1 to 4 x 1.5 = 4.4 to 6V) connected to ESC, 5V output from ESC to control and servo.
As soon as I put onto ground and try to move it then it resets. Phone appears to be really bad at handling resets, the wifi hot spot gets interrupted, so the browser no longer connects.
I tried 5 batteries, I tried 5 batteries plus 1000uF capacitors, no good.
I removed the regulator from the control and had 2 batteries into control and 3 batteries into ESC/motor. Nothing satisfactory, ordered some Lipo batteries and charger, put it on hold.
Moved to Trix, nice and simple, should be easy?
No, that doesn't work either. I think a big part of the problem is that the controller is 3V3 based.
The servos do not seem to like being powered by 6V and driven by 3V3, they make odd noises and draw lots of current.
I may try to add level conversion to control module, I may just switch to FlySky RC equipment for now and get on with turning the control module into a tiny quad copter, not sure yet.
