Alt-BEAM Archive

Message #05499



To: beam@sgiblab.sgi.com
From: Richard Piotter richfile@rconnect.com
Date: Sat, 31 Jul 1999 08:27:24 -0500
Subject: [alt-beam] Re: Flimsy legs VS Firm legs


Some suspension cant hurt (we have it), but if it's excessive, it wastes
energy. Too much work pushes the legs dowwn and less motion occurs at
the end. I have a walker that bounces a bit too. It has rigid legs. It
still walks very well for a robot that is bouncing around. It'll go a
foot in under 5 seconds when the batteries get low! It's a mere 4.5
inches long. Although springy is good for larger bot that require the
suspension to keep from rattling apart, I don't think it's perfect for
all bots.

SG wrote:
>
> i found some "music wire" about as thick
> as coat hangers and i thought the chromish look
> would give a nice plus to my "lotus" walker. the
> thing is, the legs are quite springy. you push
> down on the assembly and the bot squishes down
> about 1 inch, then springs back up. "quite flexable"
> i thought to myself....
> well, since i switched i've been having all
> sorts of problems to getting the two servos in sinc.
> i've switched resostors and caps, but i think it has
> something to do with the feedbak the motors are getting
> from the legs.
> the front legs (being much longer) seem to
> actually "bounce" when they hit the floor on one side,
> and power then is transfered in such a way to mess up
> the equal distribution.
> i have found that adding weight to the front seems
> to help, but after messing with it for a while my battery
> has run down and i can't quite tell (when batt runs down,
> not so much of a "kick" to the thrust of the legs, and no
> bounce, so it seems to walk better)
> NOW, has anyone else experienced this and has found
> that firmer stiffer legs are better? or is it that (alas)
> my circuit is just really screwed up and i need to start
> all over?
> thanks for any input!
> -Sparky

--


Richard Piotter
richfile@rconnect.com

The Richfiles Robotics & TI web page:
http://richfiles.calc.org

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BEAM Robotics Tek FAQ
http://people.ne.mediaone.net/bushbo/beam/FAQ.html



5500 Sat, 31 Jul 1999 08:05:27 -0700 A Must Read: Coupled Bicore, First Experiments beam@sgiblab.sgi.com John A. deVries II [SMTP:zozzles@lanl.gov] At 02:25 AM 07/28/1999 , Wouter Brok wrote:
>Hello everybody,
>
>The last weeks I have been busy with preparing an experiment I plan
to do
>with coupled suspended bicore oscillators. Yesterday I wrote a
little paper
>about the first results I obtained: nothing really spectacular, but
I think
>it is worth while to have a good look at it. In the paper I show
graphs of
>measurements of how a suspended bicore reacts when it is coupled to
a
>block-wave generator.

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