Saturday, August 22, 2009
blown resistor
the receiver smells like it blew a resistor and isn't responding to battery (i.e. not turning on). so no more boat this summer. good news is thats currently a $60 fix for the new version, 40 for the old version and like will the be the second old version by the time i get back to the project next summer. so hopefully something around $30? hopefully. just so i remember, the one i currently have (and is broken) is the spektrum dx 7 dual receiver (actual model name: AR7000 DSM2 7-channel receiver). and actually, having just looked it up, i'm already twice removed from the the new version. so maybe i'll be even more so by next summer. i'm going to pretend like its likely so i don't feel as bad having broken this ultra important part.
reflection
may or may not be my last post. for those of you who've been following (even just a little bit), thanks for the support.
i've changed my mind. yesterday wasn't a failure. it was a hiccup, but not a failure. i decided to spend the summer with the aim of building a remote control battleship that shot water 20 to 30 feet. i did that yesterday. the fact that it wasn't perfect isn't important. so i misgauged a couple of things. thats why I'm not in the business of making battleships. i built a functional version of exactly what i set out to build. so i'm happy with that.
furthermore, i grew imensely over the course of the project. both in terms of my building skills and my persistence skills. I've always considered myself a 'never give up' sort of person, but I certainly would've given up on the project many different times had I tried building this thing any previous summer - or school year for that matter. I put in maybe 500 hours on this guy. at minimum wage even I wouldve raked it in! but I was working for something else. or, someone else. while this project started about building a fun toy to play with, (particularly cause i had been so starved of building things while at school) the moment daniel went to work, the moment where it was all me and no one else to blame, the project turned into a prove myself project. prove myself to myself i suppose. ya i've done really cool stuff in the past, but i had help to some degree on those. this one, i wanted the project to be so me dominated that you couldn't possibly say, oh, he only could do that because his dad helped him, or oh, he didn't really contribute that much to the final product. and certainly no one was saying any of those things to me, about anything, but maybe i was saying that to myself. maybe because i didn't get a summer job and despite the fact everyone was saying this was a terrible summer to do that, i still felt that i shouldve been deserving. i don't really know, but prolly it was a mixture of all of the above. regardless, this battleship turned into a build that was for me to prove to me.
anyways, the things i learned on this build are numerous. i learned to solder, a lot in fact! i learned about low budget mockups prior to actual prototyping. i got burned 2 or three times by part flow - probably the number one lesson of the summer. nothing hurts more than going to work on a saturday morning only to find the part you need more than any other isn't there and ships from new jersey. i learned that part flow isn't just what do you need today to get under way, it is what do you need today, tomorrow, and in five days from now. you take care of that before you go out to build. i learned about motors and i got real non-physics-lab experience with the voltmeter - something that none of my prior projects gave me much of. i experienced and learned to recognize a blown fuse. i got uber frustrated with connectors and learned that often times in a big project one person's entire job is making sure all connectors are consistent. i experienced failure multiple times and got a bit better at rebounding. i learned about stress releif, but it took me a couple of tries. i got burned by center of gravity despite the fact that both others and myself had mentioned the issue many times. Instead of banking on being able to compensate, i should have run a physics model to check it out (I tried but gave up when i had trouble finding water related models. i should have tried harder). I certainly will run more models on more criteria on future projects. I learned that thats the sort of engineer i am - the do the math then the build type as opposed to the build it and figure out the issue then build it again. i learned how hard the last 10% is. I learned to stay consistent with my blog. I learned to love epoxy and hate lacquer. i decided to give up on too ambitious of plans and be realistic about both my talent and my resources. i practiced calling for help a lot. and i guess i learned to be proud of something even though i know its not as good as it could be. so i'm fighting my perfectionism. and in fact, thats something i learned, take it to the good enough not the perfection point. that was a hard lesson for me to grasp.
thats just a couple of the lessons i've learned from this project. and, i had a ton of fun along the way. it was a good summer project.
i've changed my mind. yesterday wasn't a failure. it was a hiccup, but not a failure. i decided to spend the summer with the aim of building a remote control battleship that shot water 20 to 30 feet. i did that yesterday. the fact that it wasn't perfect isn't important. so i misgauged a couple of things. thats why I'm not in the business of making battleships. i built a functional version of exactly what i set out to build. so i'm happy with that.
furthermore, i grew imensely over the course of the project. both in terms of my building skills and my persistence skills. I've always considered myself a 'never give up' sort of person, but I certainly would've given up on the project many different times had I tried building this thing any previous summer - or school year for that matter. I put in maybe 500 hours on this guy. at minimum wage even I wouldve raked it in! but I was working for something else. or, someone else. while this project started about building a fun toy to play with, (particularly cause i had been so starved of building things while at school) the moment daniel went to work, the moment where it was all me and no one else to blame, the project turned into a prove myself project. prove myself to myself i suppose. ya i've done really cool stuff in the past, but i had help to some degree on those. this one, i wanted the project to be so me dominated that you couldn't possibly say, oh, he only could do that because his dad helped him, or oh, he didn't really contribute that much to the final product. and certainly no one was saying any of those things to me, about anything, but maybe i was saying that to myself. maybe because i didn't get a summer job and despite the fact everyone was saying this was a terrible summer to do that, i still felt that i shouldve been deserving. i don't really know, but prolly it was a mixture of all of the above. regardless, this battleship turned into a build that was for me to prove to me.
anyways, the things i learned on this build are numerous. i learned to solder, a lot in fact! i learned about low budget mockups prior to actual prototyping. i got burned 2 or three times by part flow - probably the number one lesson of the summer. nothing hurts more than going to work on a saturday morning only to find the part you need more than any other isn't there and ships from new jersey. i learned that part flow isn't just what do you need today to get under way, it is what do you need today, tomorrow, and in five days from now. you take care of that before you go out to build. i learned about motors and i got real non-physics-lab experience with the voltmeter - something that none of my prior projects gave me much of. i experienced and learned to recognize a blown fuse. i got uber frustrated with connectors and learned that often times in a big project one person's entire job is making sure all connectors are consistent. i experienced failure multiple times and got a bit better at rebounding. i learned about stress releif, but it took me a couple of tries. i got burned by center of gravity despite the fact that both others and myself had mentioned the issue many times. Instead of banking on being able to compensate, i should have run a physics model to check it out (I tried but gave up when i had trouble finding water related models. i should have tried harder). I certainly will run more models on more criteria on future projects. I learned that thats the sort of engineer i am - the do the math then the build type as opposed to the build it and figure out the issue then build it again. i learned how hard the last 10% is. I learned to stay consistent with my blog. I learned to love epoxy and hate lacquer. i decided to give up on too ambitious of plans and be realistic about both my talent and my resources. i practiced calling for help a lot. and i guess i learned to be proud of something even though i know its not as good as it could be. so i'm fighting my perfectionism. and in fact, thats something i learned, take it to the good enough not the perfection point. that was a hard lesson for me to grasp.
thats just a couple of the lessons i've learned from this project. and, i had a ton of fun along the way. it was a good summer project.
Friday, August 21, 2009
Launch of the Battleship!
hi guys. ( Daniel, i didn't involve you in the christening for two reasons. sounded like you were doing stuff and it wouldn't be very exciting over the phone. and two, having thought about it, a Christening might not be up your alley. we'll run it when you get back)
i installed the decks today. Worked it out so that the turret sits above deck while the servo body lies below the deck with just the servo gear poking through. then, by drilling a hole for the servo line and moving the exit point of the water gun tube, the rotation problem of the turret was solved. i cut some of the elbowing to sit on the back deck and close the between deck opening. i outfitted the electrical deck with all the appropriate holes and installed the switches (with the drive line now sporting a 10A fuse instead of the original 3A one). taped up all the way around the edges to try and keep out any water that might come over the side of the deck. then, i threw on an American flag kinda at the last minute to give it some flavor. as hard as i worked and as much as the boat does, its not exactly all that reminiscent of a battleship. the flag didn't really help that (considering the fact it would be would be a 70' x 50' flag... not quite realistic) but it gave the boat some flavor. anyways, i finished building, so i was stoked and ready to go to war.
greg, our friend and the tahoe tennis pro, came over to see the launch.
we gave him the ready-to-run boat i bought earlier in the summer to give the battleship a target. heres a shot of the little boat driving around.
before i took him down, we had to christen the boat.
once that was done, the hunt was on. basically, greg's strategy was just to out run my boat and stay out of range of the water gun. my plan was obviously to keep him in range and then just down him in water. by this time, a crowd had amassed for the match. without any further stalling, check out some of the action.
so, the strategies set, the battle got underway. greg did a good job keeping away from me but once in a while i'd land a bit of water on him. then, the lake got a little bit choppy. waves started crashing over our boats, slowing both of us down. this was my shot. then, all of a sudden, the battleship tipped over and was under. the photographer (cough cough) missed the moment, but i'll do my best to describe the moment. greg is running away from me. he wasn't at all in danger being that I am standing in between the battleship and his boat. i'm looking at my ship and trying to come around and make an approach on him. in fact, its really similar to the video from above. i'm making about the same loop as that shot above. unfortunately, about 3/4 through the loop, the boat tips to the left. i'm maybe 10 feet away from the sinking ship so i go running (more of a frantic hopping action) to save it. i make it and grab the bottom to pull it out of the lake. i'm holding the controller in one hand and the boat in the other (now maybe 15 pounds with the additional water weight, so i can't hold it for too long). i have nowhere to put the controller and i don't happen to be using the neck lanyard i made out of shoelaces. so i'm in a pickle. being that he already missed the shot, my dad came over to help me. I really needed the help. so, we get the boat drained of water (via flipping it upside and letting water leak out through the (supposed to be waterproof) taping around the edges of the decks. then i put the boat back in the water. eager for revenge i went for blood.
actually, to be honest, as you might be able to percieve from the video, i jumped back from the boat because i didn't expect it to start up yet. so i didn't try and hit greg, i did so accidentally. the ramming wasn't part of my gameplan but hey, whatever works! and yet, i spent the summer building this thing, most of the time working to make the gun function, so i wasn't interested in just ramming. i came to shoot some water around. so i go set to do so. unfortunately, i wasn't going to be able to fix the top heavyness of the boat during the battle. i had to just hope it would hold up until i sunk greg's boat.
however, following the the successfull ramming, thins went down hill - or maybe down water?
so things looked grim. and actually, they were grim. the controller got wet just after this shot and that ended the fight. (greg's boat was near out of battery - next time, i just wait for his boat to run out of battery cause i have maybe 2 or 3 times the battery life he does). so, that was it. thats what i worked all summer for.
but no, thats not true. i got a lot more out this than the essential failure that transpired out on the lake today. but i've been writing this blog for too long, i'll get to the lessons i learned tomorrow or maybe later today.
i installed the decks today. Worked it out so that the turret sits above deck while the servo body lies below the deck with just the servo gear poking through. then, by drilling a hole for the servo line and moving the exit point of the water gun tube, the rotation problem of the turret was solved. i cut some of the elbowing to sit on the back deck and close the between deck opening. i outfitted the electrical deck with all the appropriate holes and installed the switches (with the drive line now sporting a 10A fuse instead of the original 3A one). taped up all the way around the edges to try and keep out any water that might come over the side of the deck. then, i threw on an American flag kinda at the last minute to give it some flavor. as hard as i worked and as much as the boat does, its not exactly all that reminiscent of a battleship. the flag didn't really help that (considering the fact it would be would be a 70' x 50' flag... not quite realistic) but it gave the boat some flavor. anyways, i finished building, so i was stoked and ready to go to war.
greg, our friend and the tahoe tennis pro, came over to see the launch.
we gave him the ready-to-run boat i bought earlier in the summer to give the battleship a target. heres a shot of the little boat driving around.
before i took him down, we had to christen the boat.
once that was done, the hunt was on. basically, greg's strategy was just to out run my boat and stay out of range of the water gun. my plan was obviously to keep him in range and then just down him in water. by this time, a crowd had amassed for the match. without any further stalling, check out some of the action.
so, the strategies set, the battle got underway. greg did a good job keeping away from me but once in a while i'd land a bit of water on him. then, the lake got a little bit choppy. waves started crashing over our boats, slowing both of us down. this was my shot. then, all of a sudden, the battleship tipped over and was under. the photographer (cough cough) missed the moment, but i'll do my best to describe the moment. greg is running away from me. he wasn't at all in danger being that I am standing in between the battleship and his boat. i'm looking at my ship and trying to come around and make an approach on him. in fact, its really similar to the video from above. i'm making about the same loop as that shot above. unfortunately, about 3/4 through the loop, the boat tips to the left. i'm maybe 10 feet away from the sinking ship so i go running (more of a frantic hopping action) to save it. i make it and grab the bottom to pull it out of the lake. i'm holding the controller in one hand and the boat in the other (now maybe 15 pounds with the additional water weight, so i can't hold it for too long). i have nowhere to put the controller and i don't happen to be using the neck lanyard i made out of shoelaces. so i'm in a pickle. being that he already missed the shot, my dad came over to help me. I really needed the help. so, we get the boat drained of water (via flipping it upside and letting water leak out through the (supposed to be waterproof) taping around the edges of the decks. then i put the boat back in the water. eager for revenge i went for blood.
actually, to be honest, as you might be able to percieve from the video, i jumped back from the boat because i didn't expect it to start up yet. so i didn't try and hit greg, i did so accidentally. the ramming wasn't part of my gameplan but hey, whatever works! and yet, i spent the summer building this thing, most of the time working to make the gun function, so i wasn't interested in just ramming. i came to shoot some water around. so i go set to do so. unfortunately, i wasn't going to be able to fix the top heavyness of the boat during the battle. i had to just hope it would hold up until i sunk greg's boat.
however, following the the successfull ramming, thins went down hill - or maybe down water?
so things looked grim. and actually, they were grim. the controller got wet just after this shot and that ended the fight. (greg's boat was near out of battery - next time, i just wait for his boat to run out of battery cause i have maybe 2 or 3 times the battery life he does). so, that was it. thats what i worked all summer for.
but no, thats not true. i got a lot more out this than the essential failure that transpired out on the lake today. but i've been writing this blog for too long, i'll get to the lessons i learned tomorrow or maybe later today.
Thursday, August 20, 2009
final tune-up
woo doggie!!!
so after yesterdays disaster, i was looking for today to be big. not halfway thru the day, its delivered. like i said before, the issue with the switch line was a blown fuse. i had my dad go get some 5A fuses. out on the water, one of those broke too. but i'll get to that later.
so we took the boat out for a final tune up test today. and it performed beautifully after figuring out the fuse blew again. i connected the ESC directly to the battery and it worked just fine. I had the boat pumping, shooting and driving. check it out!
i taped up the back deck so water couldn't sneak in and it works beautifully! hardly any water got in the hull at all. so that was excelent. and then the boat moves pretty quick, which is good. the only downer is that the boat leans pretty heavily to the right. its scary sometimes cause it looks almost like its tipping. so i gotta make sure the deck up front is as waterproof as the back. a novel idea to fix that is to add some weight to the end of a servo arm and in route adjust where it sits to counteract the leaning. i'm mostly sure the leaning is due to the slightly off centering of the water tank.
anyways. the boat works pretty well and theres only one left thing left to do. put on some decking!
so after yesterdays disaster, i was looking for today to be big. not halfway thru the day, its delivered. like i said before, the issue with the switch line was a blown fuse. i had my dad go get some 5A fuses. out on the water, one of those broke too. but i'll get to that later.
so we took the boat out for a final tune up test today. and it performed beautifully after figuring out the fuse blew again. i connected the ESC directly to the battery and it worked just fine. I had the boat pumping, shooting and driving. check it out!
i taped up the back deck so water couldn't sneak in and it works beautifully! hardly any water got in the hull at all. so that was excelent. and then the boat moves pretty quick, which is good. the only downer is that the boat leans pretty heavily to the right. its scary sometimes cause it looks almost like its tipping. so i gotta make sure the deck up front is as waterproof as the back. a novel idea to fix that is to add some weight to the end of a servo arm and in route adjust where it sits to counteract the leaning. i'm mostly sure the leaning is due to the slightly off centering of the water tank.
anyways. the boat works pretty well and theres only one left thing left to do. put on some decking!
switch problem
so the problem with the switch was that the fuse just barely blew. i've never worked with switches before and so when i opened it to check on it, i saw the wire was still connected, just with a minor bend in it. well, evidently thats enough to not flow anymore. i shouldve checked continuity with the voltmeter, i didn't think to do that til this morning.
Wednesday, August 19, 2009
PHEW! Dodged a bullet
hey guys. i was planning to have it all glueing tonight and ready for christening tomorrow but I ran into a bit of a problem. in fact, it was a 'holy crap i'm not, not the battleship, the whole project is over' type problem. ya, pretty frightening. heres what happened.
so, like i said, i zip tied all the wires to the sides and to the various components such that there was minimal stress on the leads and also to keep as organized as possible. i showed you a picture yesterday of that. well, sometime yesterday and then also today, the speed controller started acting up. i went and read the instructions for the ESC (a piece of junk manual) and learned of a possible issue that i then internet researched and learned i should do something about it. i needed to remove the positive battery wire so that the bec (which i just learned about today and is basically like an internal battery) wouldn't interfere with the actual battery. so i did. then things stopped working. by things i mean the speed controller wasn't passing on voltage. 7.4 V in, .1 V out. essentially, BAD. so i put back the wire. still nothing. i started disconnecting things left and right. BY THE WAY. this was right before i was about to go out and do a last pre-deck test before assemblying the deck. i had already put on the back deck
and taped it up to keep out the water as best as possible. so i was super excited to go and test both the drive and the pump. (if you notice the water gun video, the boat is not moving. thats because the problem was on and off that day too. thats why i went looking at the manual, thats why i did the research and pulled the positive battery wire. thats where our story started) however, it was not to be. like i said the ESC wasn't working and i was flipping out. i removed all sorts of things and nothing was helping. i broke out the voltmeter and worked back from the motors. .1V at the motors. .1 at the parallel split point. .1 after the ESC. 7.4 before the ESC. obviously, something was wrong with the ESC. what? Spent all afternoon debugging. nothing.
i called my contact, looking for help, right around dinner time. that wasn't really very considerate, but i was getting desperate. this isn't a part i can replace in lest than a week or so. and i go to vassar in exactly a week (HOLY MOLY THATs EXCiTING!). so this kills the project.
like last time, i described stuff to him, he suggested some things i had already tried, so i threw out some possible keyterms that might help him remember a solution. but this time, didn't help.
i went and had dinner, after which stephen called back with a new suggestion. didn't help. we agreed to talk again tomorrow before giving up. after the call, i was upset and so i started over again. this time i took EVERYTHING out. no servos connected, no pump system, just the battery to the ESC to the voltmeter. and it worked! so i started putting things back in, hoping it would stop working at some point so i would know what the problem was. if i got all the way to the end, i'd be nervous that it was just being spotty again and i hadn't fixed anything.
however, i put in the rudder servo and it stopped working. it turns out, the rudder servo fits in right-side-up and upside-down. upside-down screws up the reciever and also the ESC. so, flipping over the rudder servo kept things working. i kept adding things on. the next thing that disrupted the system was the switch+fuse that i installed. i didn't figure out why tonight, but i'll look into it tomorrow. i was just happy to have figured out what happened. and rather, i was just happy to have a working ESC.
so, while i didn't get much done today - though i installed the back deck - i still have a project. that is, i'm not hosed. which is good. :)
so, like i said, i zip tied all the wires to the sides and to the various components such that there was minimal stress on the leads and also to keep as organized as possible. i showed you a picture yesterday of that. well, sometime yesterday and then also today, the speed controller started acting up. i went and read the instructions for the ESC (a piece of junk manual) and learned of a possible issue that i then internet researched and learned i should do something about it. i needed to remove the positive battery wire so that the bec (which i just learned about today and is basically like an internal battery) wouldn't interfere with the actual battery. so i did. then things stopped working. by things i mean the speed controller wasn't passing on voltage. 7.4 V in, .1 V out. essentially, BAD. so i put back the wire. still nothing. i started disconnecting things left and right. BY THE WAY. this was right before i was about to go out and do a last pre-deck test before assemblying the deck. i had already put on the back deck
and taped it up to keep out the water as best as possible. so i was super excited to go and test both the drive and the pump. (if you notice the water gun video, the boat is not moving. thats because the problem was on and off that day too. thats why i went looking at the manual, thats why i did the research and pulled the positive battery wire. thats where our story started) however, it was not to be. like i said the ESC wasn't working and i was flipping out. i removed all sorts of things and nothing was helping. i broke out the voltmeter and worked back from the motors. .1V at the motors. .1 at the parallel split point. .1 after the ESC. 7.4 before the ESC. obviously, something was wrong with the ESC. what? Spent all afternoon debugging. nothing.
i called my contact, looking for help, right around dinner time. that wasn't really very considerate, but i was getting desperate. this isn't a part i can replace in lest than a week or so. and i go to vassar in exactly a week (HOLY MOLY THATs EXCiTING!). so this kills the project.
like last time, i described stuff to him, he suggested some things i had already tried, so i threw out some possible keyterms that might help him remember a solution. but this time, didn't help.
i went and had dinner, after which stephen called back with a new suggestion. didn't help. we agreed to talk again tomorrow before giving up. after the call, i was upset and so i started over again. this time i took EVERYTHING out. no servos connected, no pump system, just the battery to the ESC to the voltmeter. and it worked! so i started putting things back in, hoping it would stop working at some point so i would know what the problem was. if i got all the way to the end, i'd be nervous that it was just being spotty again and i hadn't fixed anything.
however, i put in the rudder servo and it stopped working. it turns out, the rudder servo fits in right-side-up and upside-down. upside-down screws up the reciever and also the ESC. so, flipping over the rudder servo kept things working. i kept adding things on. the next thing that disrupted the system was the switch+fuse that i installed. i didn't figure out why tonight, but i'll look into it tomorrow. i was just happy to have figured out what happened. and rather, i was just happy to have a working ESC.
so, while i didn't get much done today - though i installed the back deck - i still have a project. that is, i'm not hosed. which is good. :)
Tuesday, August 18, 2009
system check 2 (minus the sinking)
the waves couldn't sink me this time. well, they could've, but i didn't let them!
i patched up the broken leads and resoldered everything, and ziptied all the wires to make it slightly less chaotic. take a look.
and, if you're not familiar with electronics projects, thats fairly clean. go back and check it out before, on the blog maybe like 4 or 5 days back.
k, so we got everything working and then we headed out to the lake. the first time we didn't get any photos. plus, another lead snapped off so i took it back, fixed it, then we headed back out. take a look.
woOOOooo! it works!! i'm so stoked!! i took it back in and this afternoon i've gotten to work on how the deck will connect. i'm going to epoxy these guys to the side of the hull then screw the deck into them.
i'll put rubber underneath so that it'll be mostly water tight. then the only way for water to get in is the place where the deck portions meet.
might be real launch tomorrow, might be thursday.
P.S. check out my dad's project.
so the story is, when i was little, we went fishing and we sat on the bank for hours, never even getting a bite! at the end, i asked him, in with my youthful innoncence, "why do they call it fishing? theres no fish involved." so, this time instead of randomly throwing in the line, he's taking an engineer's approach. he went out and got an underwater camera, and some camera (cyclops) glasses
so he's going to spot the fishes, then catch them. or thats the plan. today's update is that you can't really tell what you're looking at. its just blue in all directions. EXCEPT when you hit the camera on the bottom of the lake. then you see the sandy bottom. hehe. he'll get it working. and so will i!
i patched up the broken leads and resoldered everything, and ziptied all the wires to make it slightly less chaotic. take a look.
and, if you're not familiar with electronics projects, thats fairly clean. go back and check it out before, on the blog maybe like 4 or 5 days back.
k, so we got everything working and then we headed out to the lake. the first time we didn't get any photos. plus, another lead snapped off so i took it back, fixed it, then we headed back out. take a look.
woOOOooo! it works!! i'm so stoked!! i took it back in and this afternoon i've gotten to work on how the deck will connect. i'm going to epoxy these guys to the side of the hull then screw the deck into them.
i'll put rubber underneath so that it'll be mostly water tight. then the only way for water to get in is the place where the deck portions meet.
might be real launch tomorrow, might be thursday.
P.S. check out my dad's project.
so the story is, when i was little, we went fishing and we sat on the bank for hours, never even getting a bite! at the end, i asked him, in with my youthful innoncence, "why do they call it fishing? theres no fish involved." so, this time instead of randomly throwing in the line, he's taking an engineer's approach. he went out and got an underwater camera, and some camera (cyclops) glasses
so he's going to spot the fishes, then catch them. or thats the plan. today's update is that you can't really tell what you're looking at. its just blue in all directions. EXCEPT when you hit the camera on the bottom of the lake. then you see the sandy bottom. hehe. he'll get it working. and so will i!
Monday, August 17, 2009
restock day
big driving adventure today. drove all over the place today. went half an hour to truckee to get to radioshack. worst radioshack in the world. it didn't even have wire. how the hell can a radio shack not have wiring for sale? and then i went to a hardware store and went looking for stuff. got some of it, not others of it. i dunno. i've basically been in a funk today. so i didn't really accomplish much today. well, not true, i got most all the materials from here to the finish line. so thats good
Sunday, August 16, 2009
win some you lose some
i rechecked the numbers and am embarrased to say i should have seen this coming. i ran the numbers for all boats except the one i ended up getting. in my analysis of which boat to get, i off handedly said, "why would i get the semi kit, i'll skip that one". then, when i actually went and got a hull, i got the one i didn't run the numbers for. really, it shouldn't have matter because i should have run the numbers twice more after i bought the boat and before i installed the components. well, anyways, i didn't, and that was a mistake. check it out. the tank holds 1700 ml (.5 gallon) of water, or almost 4 pounds. the boat can support a total of 12 lbs. the hull is maybe 2 or 3 pounds, motors and batteries maybe 4 or 5, with maybe a pound or two of extra stuff, that adds up to too heavy.
the brilliant fix for the weight problem is to flip the level switch so that the tank stays almost empty instead of almost full. the trigger will go about an half an inch from the bottom. thats maybe 1/5 full. so something like 350 ml or 1 ish lb.
however, looking at the tank,
theres a bridge sort of thing in the middle and the issue is going to be the water comes in from the back and will fill the back end and no the front end. when the water level goes above the bridge its going to start filling the front section. this means instead of having a shallow water level its going to actually be about half full. which means maybe two pounds. the solution to this is the fill the back area with lighter non-water stuff. should be pretty easy to do... o wait, how am i gonna manuaver with no access point . its going to be building a ship in a bottle. so thats gonna be hard.
to make things worse, the relay lead broke. so i gotta go take all the soldering off that guy and get a new one. it turns out the sinking did more damage than i thought.
more sorta good news, i found a problem with the esc and i fixed it. its not worth getting into. problem, and got fixed.
kinda got start over in a sense tomorrow. but i'll push through
the brilliant fix for the weight problem is to flip the level switch so that the tank stays almost empty instead of almost full. the trigger will go about an half an inch from the bottom. thats maybe 1/5 full. so something like 350 ml or 1 ish lb.
however, looking at the tank,
theres a bridge sort of thing in the middle and the issue is going to be the water comes in from the back and will fill the back end and no the front end. when the water level goes above the bridge its going to start filling the front section. this means instead of having a shallow water level its going to actually be about half full. which means maybe two pounds. the solution to this is the fill the back area with lighter non-water stuff. should be pretty easy to do... o wait, how am i gonna manuaver with no access point . its going to be building a ship in a bottle. so thats gonna be hard.
to make things worse, the relay lead broke. so i gotta go take all the soldering off that guy and get a new one. it turns out the sinking did more damage than i thought.
more sorta good news, i found a problem with the esc and i fixed it. its not worth getting into. problem, and got fixed.
kinda got start over in a sense tomorrow. but i'll push through
First Launch!
big day today!
woke up this morning happy to see all the laquer had set and was ready for installation. i epoxied in all the bases and hooked up all the electronics. soldering the switches i had forgotten previously and then was ready to check functionality. check out the rat's nest
despite the aesthetic ache, all systems were go.
So, i took her out to test all systems installed. like i said, on land, everything was perfect. level switch and sub pump worked nicely, gun pump was ready for battle, and the rudder + motors were a go. so. i took it out to the lake. no deck installed yet, but it didn't matter, i wasn't going to sink from wave washover. so, i headed out to test the boat.
check it out
so. if you couldn't tell.... it sank. with the additional weight of the water in the water tank, the back dropped low enough such that wave washover DID do me in. in all of what, i guess 3 seconds, the whole ship was under. my dad, typical, stopped taking pictures and tried to help, but thankfully bruce (a professional photographer), stayed focus so i could bring to you that video. thank goodness. at least something came out of the sinking. anyways, it sunk, and that was BAD. i took it back to land and tried all systems and got them working again and decided to take it over the dock in the hopes the pier would provide some much needed protection from the waves. so we headed over to the pier.
we decided to just test the driving with all systems in with the exception of the water tank. this being essentially the exact set up as a couple days ago when i had the successful run (after fixing the prop directions) except that there was slightly more weight, i wasn't surprised that the boat drove pretty nicely. see for yourself
however, then the radio receiver started acting up. it was just being finicky. sometimes it'd work, sometimes it wouldn't. we had two theories. the sinking of the boat earlier had completely drowned the hull of water so one explanation was that water got in the system and upset things. alternatively, the finicky-ness seemed to indicate that maybe there was a faulty wire somewhere.
i'm currently letting the boat dry out to try and eliminate one of the two possibilities. plus, i'm cooling off. i was pretty excited and then pretty un-excited. however, its been maybe an hour and i'm somewhat oppimistic. look at it this way.
the only thing that failed was weight. i have a couple of different ways i can fix that. i can figure out a way to change the level at which the level switch triggers the sub pump. i could remove the level switch and make it a rc controlled component like the gun pump is. I don't konw what i'll do, but its not an impossible problem. which is good. also good is the fact that everything worked. the pumps both worked before the sinking, the level switch too. the drive still worked. and so i guess i kinda only have one issue and then i'm all perfect. hopefully.
however, today, i had a sunken battleship
woke up this morning happy to see all the laquer had set and was ready for installation. i epoxied in all the bases and hooked up all the electronics. soldering the switches i had forgotten previously and then was ready to check functionality. check out the rat's nest
despite the aesthetic ache, all systems were go.
So, i took her out to test all systems installed. like i said, on land, everything was perfect. level switch and sub pump worked nicely, gun pump was ready for battle, and the rudder + motors were a go. so. i took it out to the lake. no deck installed yet, but it didn't matter, i wasn't going to sink from wave washover. so, i headed out to test the boat.
check it out
so. if you couldn't tell.... it sank. with the additional weight of the water in the water tank, the back dropped low enough such that wave washover DID do me in. in all of what, i guess 3 seconds, the whole ship was under. my dad, typical, stopped taking pictures and tried to help, but thankfully bruce (a professional photographer), stayed focus so i could bring to you that video. thank goodness. at least something came out of the sinking. anyways, it sunk, and that was BAD. i took it back to land and tried all systems and got them working again and decided to take it over the dock in the hopes the pier would provide some much needed protection from the waves. so we headed over to the pier.
we decided to just test the driving with all systems in with the exception of the water tank. this being essentially the exact set up as a couple days ago when i had the successful run (after fixing the prop directions) except that there was slightly more weight, i wasn't surprised that the boat drove pretty nicely. see for yourself
however, then the radio receiver started acting up. it was just being finicky. sometimes it'd work, sometimes it wouldn't. we had two theories. the sinking of the boat earlier had completely drowned the hull of water so one explanation was that water got in the system and upset things. alternatively, the finicky-ness seemed to indicate that maybe there was a faulty wire somewhere.
i'm currently letting the boat dry out to try and eliminate one of the two possibilities. plus, i'm cooling off. i was pretty excited and then pretty un-excited. however, its been maybe an hour and i'm somewhat oppimistic. look at it this way.
the only thing that failed was weight. i have a couple of different ways i can fix that. i can figure out a way to change the level at which the level switch triggers the sub pump. i could remove the level switch and make it a rc controlled component like the gun pump is. I don't konw what i'll do, but its not an impossible problem. which is good. also good is the fact that everything worked. the pumps both worked before the sinking, the level switch too. the drive still worked. and so i guess i kinda only have one issue and then i'm all perfect. hopefully.
however, today, i had a sunken battleship
Saturday, August 15, 2009
what does it laquer?
hey, new follower (pushes us up to a monstrocious four),
today took a change of plans. instead of installing everything, i decided it was more important to go seal all the wood so it would be mostly waterproof for installation than to do it afterwards. i'm supposed to wait 24 hours for the second coat, but i decided 3 was enough... hehe... watever, its just the pump bases so its not critical. the top decks and sub decks i'm going to wait out the appropriate time and thats both because its way more important and i can afford to wait cause the soonest i'll need the decks will be tomorrow evening. so if i laquer them tomorrow morning, i'll be somewhat good.
funny story about the laquering, i did it and then had no thinner to get it off my hands. so i had to wait half an hour with sticky hands while my dad got some thinner.
today took a change of plans. instead of installing everything, i decided it was more important to go seal all the wood so it would be mostly waterproof for installation than to do it afterwards. i'm supposed to wait 24 hours for the second coat, but i decided 3 was enough... hehe... watever, its just the pump bases so its not critical. the top decks and sub decks i'm going to wait out the appropriate time and thats both because its way more important and i can afford to wait cause the soonest i'll need the decks will be tomorrow evening. so if i laquer them tomorrow morning, i'll be somewhat good.
funny story about the laquering, i did it and then had no thinner to get it off my hands. so i had to wait half an hour with sticky hands while my dad got some thinner.
Friday, August 14, 2009
get ready for installation
hey guys!
so the sub pump is installed, i believe i told you that yesterday, but its now funcional! i went and tested the pumpage and it works well :)
also, i kept working on the bases for the various components. i bulit a holder for the rc reciever
i've laid out the whole interior so i'll start glueing in components tomorrow. after that i have to outfit the decks - install the subdecks, figure out how to secure the main decks, split them up, then put in the connectors and switches. all that is
Thursday, August 13, 2009
spirits up again
so, the caulk actually works fairly well. i think it might be the answer. however, i decided to go work on something else this evening. i decided to finish the soldering today. so i rigged up the relay and slapped on the deans and bullet connectors. and thats about it. i finished the soldering. well, except if i want to put in the extra fuse. and maybe the switch i forgot to put in. but tomorrow i put it together. saturday i put the decks on. and then sunday i fix things. should be ready to go monday. !!!!
caulk to the rescue
we went to the hardware store and got some silicone caulk sealent and it seems to work pretty well. not perfect, but functionally.
sub pump
i drilled the whole for the sub pump and its not the right size. kinda a problem. i'll get back to yoiu
Wednesday, August 12, 2009
gun check
man, i'm on a roll!!!!
gun system check:
i soldered together this 3 way parallel deans with a fuse and ... shoot! i forgot to put in the on/off switch. o well, i'll stick it in there later. dang. anyways, i soldered this whole guy after all the excitement from the drive testing.
because i had worked out how the system all fit together, i knew what to do.
then it was just a matter of alligatoring the components to their appropriate connection point, and turning the sucker on.
or so i thought. it wasn't that simple. i spent a good half an hour trying to figure out why nothing was working. well, thats not fair, the battle switch was switching, but the pump connected to it wasn't turning on. this turned out to be key though. eventually it dawned on me, the only thing that was running, was being powered by the RC reciever. that meant, the battery wasn't getting to the components. but i had the watts up in and it read that voltage was running. after a minute, i realized, you know what, maybe there needs to be a fuse in the fuse holder. ha, just you know, maybe.
once i popped in a fuse, the pumps sang!
gun system check:
i soldered together this 3 way parallel deans with a fuse and ... shoot! i forgot to put in the on/off switch. o well, i'll stick it in there later. dang. anyways, i soldered this whole guy after all the excitement from the drive testing.
because i had worked out how the system all fit together, i knew what to do.
then it was just a matter of alligatoring the components to their appropriate connection point, and turning the sucker on.
or so i thought. it wasn't that simple. i spent a good half an hour trying to figure out why nothing was working. well, thats not fair, the battle switch was switching, but the pump connected to it wasn't turning on. this turned out to be key though. eventually it dawned on me, the only thing that was running, was being powered by the RC reciever. that meant, the battery wasn't getting to the components. but i had the watts up in and it read that voltage was running. after a minute, i realized, you know what, maybe there needs to be a fuse in the fuse holder. ha, just you know, maybe.
once i popped in a fuse, the pumps sang!
we have liftoff!
Waaaahhhhzzzooooo!!!!
it works!!!!
so like i said, i called contact who knows RC boats. I described the issues and he came to mostly the same conclusions i had - add weight, you might have to fix the prop shaft friction, etc.
[background: in my internet research, i kept hearing this word, "cavitation". dumbly, i never looked it up. however, i lucked into coming across all this talk about r + l handed props and how its ideal to have the screws turn opposite directions, specifically the left one turns counterclockwise and the right one turns clockwise. when i read it, i thought, "oh, how smart, turn opposite so that together it pushes the boat straight. but how am i gonna make the motors turn opposite directions when i have them hooked up in parrallel to the same ESC?" (stupid thought, but i make up for it later) anyways, i got all together nowhere (i thought) with my internet research. so i went out to check out the problem again. it persisted. water churned up instead of back and the boat almost pivoted to the right without rudder involvement. so i called stephen, my rc boat friend.]
then i brought up maybe something to do with the right or left handed props caused some sort of problem.
[a little more background, sorry: this is the way my dad has taught me to ask questions. first, you lay out the problem, and hope they can answer the implied questions. next, you kinda through out knowledge that you've gained from the research you've already done, hoping a key term sparks some chunk of knowledge in their brain such that they answer the implied question. lastly, you straight up ask them, "what question should i be asking that I am not smart enough to know to ask?" its a pretty effective system. ]
so i threw out the hook and to my surpise it worked. he said, "yep, they should turn the opposite direction" (in my head i thought, ya, but how!) then it hit me. i'm an idiot. electric motors are the easiest thing in the world to reverse direction. you just switch polarity! i confirmed this with him, and he actually suggested this fix might end up solving both issues. how sweet!
so i switch the polarity. turns out, i had a 1 in 4 shot of putting the motors in right. i got it half right. so i switched the direction of the left motor (which makes sense since if you remember i had thought the left was stronger than the right, making it turn right. but actually, it wasn't supposed to be turning that way, rather the other way. so i sort of made it weaker. if you didn't follow, don't worry, its a criss-crossy sort of idea).
i took her out, and she worked perfectly. with little to no throttle she goes!!!! and if i were to go to full throttle, i'm sure shed fly! and reverse works just as well!!!!
oh by the way, the word i came across, cavitation. means "formation of low pressure bubbles by means of mechanical forces, such as those resulting from rotation of a marine motor" ha! kinda exactly what i needed. whoops!
drive fix brainstorm
hey all,
since i dont have daniel here, and my dad is working on getting our fridge fixed (a far more important issue than bouncing ideas w/ me), i'm gonna bounce ideas off you. and clearly you're not going to bounce them back, but at least i'm putting thme out there. here goes:
symptom: the boat turns to the right
possible cause(s): the left motor is more efficient; is better aligned; is better greased; other
comments: its prolly not better greasing because the problem existed before i greased both prop shafts. they're the same motor so i gotta believe its not that
symptom: wash from props goes up not back
cause: not enough weight; bad prop angle; wrong prop rotation
comments: in terms of the prop rotation, i don't really know what i'm talking about here, but i keep reading online that the props are right and left handed and they should be spinning a particular way. i'll ask my guy if i can't solve it
________________
spent an hour or two working on it and got nowhere. just called the guy i know who battles the boats and learned the motors are supposed to be turning opposite ways and the props should be as well (duh). he suggested that might solve both problems! good thing i read stuff online! im gonna go try some stuff!
since i dont have daniel here, and my dad is working on getting our fridge fixed (a far more important issue than bouncing ideas w/ me), i'm gonna bounce ideas off you. and clearly you're not going to bounce them back, but at least i'm putting thme out there. here goes:
symptom: the boat turns to the right
possible cause(s): the left motor is more efficient; is better aligned; is better greased; other
comments: its prolly not better greasing because the problem existed before i greased both prop shafts. they're the same motor so i gotta believe its not that
symptom: wash from props goes up not back
cause: not enough weight; bad prop angle; wrong prop rotation
comments: in terms of the prop rotation, i don't really know what i'm talking about here, but i keep reading online that the props are right and left handed and they should be spinning a particular way. i'll ask my guy if i can't solve it
________________
spent an hour or two working on it and got nowhere. just called the guy i know who battles the boats and learned the motors are supposed to be turning opposite ways and the props should be as well (duh). he suggested that might solve both problems! good thing i read stuff online! im gonna go try some stuff!
Tuesday, August 11, 2009
drive system lessons p.2
well, those helped, but its still only at 'sorta works' not quite at 'works' yet.
so the grease solved the problem i had before that water got in the rudder tube. it also smoothed up the prop shaft in the assembly tube, meaning both screws turn better. it means the props move the boat slightly better. but only slightly. plus, it turns out the rudder doesn't rock. nope. in fact it kinda sucks. i have to offset it some to compensate for some inequality between the two motors/screws. for some reason, the boat naturally turns right, meaning the left motor is either stronger or the allignment is somehow off causing the turning. because of this, i set up the rudder a bit to the left (the tail of the rudder is on the side that the boat will turn).
on a plus note, i was able to go in a circle to the right (really easily) and to the left (rather slowly).
for tomorrow, i guess i need to figure out why its tending to the right and figure out why the screws are so ineffective at propelling the boat.
so the grease solved the problem i had before that water got in the rudder tube. it also smoothed up the prop shaft in the assembly tube, meaning both screws turn better. it means the props move the boat slightly better. but only slightly. plus, it turns out the rudder doesn't rock. nope. in fact it kinda sucks. i have to offset it some to compensate for some inequality between the two motors/screws. for some reason, the boat naturally turns right, meaning the left motor is either stronger or the allignment is somehow off causing the turning. because of this, i set up the rudder a bit to the left (the tail of the rudder is on the side that the boat will turn).
on a plus note, i was able to go in a circle to the right (really easily) and to the left (rather slowly).
for tomorrow, i guess i need to figure out why its tending to the right and figure out why the screws are so ineffective at propelling the boat.
drive system lessons
WOOooooooooo!!!!! it kinda sorta works!!!! wahoooo!!
so. heres what happened. 1st: the scientific method kicks butt. i had a hypothesis, and a control, and the experimental proved my hypothesis. the sound completely went away when i put the boat in the water!!!
lessons:
wear swimsuit for all future tests
you really do need the grease for the prop shaft and the rudder
weight is good
the rudder kicks butt... but only when the boat is moving, otherwise its useless
let me go fix all that, then try again
so. heres what happened. 1st: the scientific method kicks butt. i had a hypothesis, and a control, and the experimental proved my hypothesis. the sound completely went away when i put the boat in the water!!!
lessons:
wear swimsuit for all future tests
you really do need the grease for the prop shaft and the rudder
weight is good
the rudder kicks butt... but only when the boat is moving, otherwise its useless
let me go fix all that, then try again
system check 1
i spent all afternoon on the damn rudder servo, outfitting cross beams to mount to. ARG so agravating. well anyways, i finally got it all lined up, and installed. its not level, which is a problem, but only a minor problem. it'll put extra strain on the servo and require more torque to turn the rudder. however, since i'm way way under the torque the servo can give me, i'm fine. the rudder servo turns the rudder nicely. if i hadn't told you the level issue, from the outside, you'd say it works perfectly! :) the fact it works is good, cause i don't know how i'd fix the issue if i had to.
i've hooked the whole drive system up on drydock and been cruelly reminded how ill-alligned the motors are. worse still, BOTH motors are out of alignment. they're making a chilling door-creaking type sound. it comes from the drive-dog rubbing against the stuffing tube. however, i think the sound will go away in the water. heres why. from my prototypes, i ran into a million different problems with the connection between the drive shaft and the prop shaft. first the surgical tubing got twisted, then the shaft pushed itself out of the subskate. but the cause of a number of the issues was that the allignment was functional out of water but under strain (when the props were actually creating force), something changed. often times, the root of the problem was that the shaft was pushed forward from the screw's force. ahah! this is actually just what i want at the moment. gravity brings the drive dog to rest upon the stuffing tube, creating the soul-piercing noise. but with the force of the screws pushing the prop shaft forward, the drive dogs won't rest on the stuffing tube anymore. it will be pushed forward - into the dog bone, into the motor, into the motor mounts, and finally into the boat! (hopefully) so I THINK the issue i'm having on drydock will go away in the water. only one way to find out!
Drive system check #1
6 pm
August 11, 2009
Lake Tahoe
i've hooked the whole drive system up on drydock and been cruelly reminded how ill-alligned the motors are. worse still, BOTH motors are out of alignment. they're making a chilling door-creaking type sound. it comes from the drive-dog rubbing against the stuffing tube. however, i think the sound will go away in the water. heres why. from my prototypes, i ran into a million different problems with the connection between the drive shaft and the prop shaft. first the surgical tubing got twisted, then the shaft pushed itself out of the subskate. but the cause of a number of the issues was that the allignment was functional out of water but under strain (when the props were actually creating force), something changed. often times, the root of the problem was that the shaft was pushed forward from the screw's force. ahah! this is actually just what i want at the moment. gravity brings the drive dog to rest upon the stuffing tube, creating the soul-piercing noise. but with the force of the screws pushing the prop shaft forward, the drive dogs won't rest on the stuffing tube anymore. it will be pushed forward - into the dog bone, into the motor, into the motor mounts, and finally into the boat! (hopefully) so I THINK the issue i'm having on drydock will go away in the water. only one way to find out!
Drive system check #1
6 pm
August 11, 2009
Lake Tahoe
Monday, August 10, 2009
back to it!
hey all, i'm back to business.
spent about an hour or two figuring out if i actually had everything up here, and what i should be doing next. had a long talk with my dad about stuff and decided to start fitting everything to the bottom of the hull. velcro for most of the servos and screws and nuts for the pump and b.switch.
the current plan is to do a system test each day if possible from here till the finish line. tomorrow's is to test the entire drive system. no top deck, no pump(s), just the drive. it should work and not leak (since the minor leak via the rudder shaft will be fixed by some grease i'm getting tomorrow).
i'm pretty rusty but i'm getting back in to it.
spent about an hour or two figuring out if i actually had everything up here, and what i should be doing next. had a long talk with my dad about stuff and decided to start fitting everything to the bottom of the hull. velcro for most of the servos and screws and nuts for the pump and b.switch.
the current plan is to do a system test each day if possible from here till the finish line. tomorrow's is to test the entire drive system. no top deck, no pump(s), just the drive. it should work and not leak (since the minor leak via the rudder shaft will be fixed by some grease i'm getting tomorrow).
i'm pretty rusty but i'm getting back in to it.
Tuesday, August 4, 2009
big waves
Um.... guys... i'm sitting at tahoe, looking out at the gorgeous lake... and i'm pretty afraid those foot high waves are going to crush the boat. its only going to sit about 6 inches or so above the water... meaning its gotta be able to withstand the wave crashing on deck. i gotta toughen it up for that
Sunday, August 2, 2009
UG!
i was convinced to take a day off today. now i'm itching to get back to it. but it means i won't make the deadline.
saturday blog (on sunday)
i missed blogging yesterday so i'm doing it this morning.
got some free manual labor from daniel yesterday. he fitted the new radio box to have the cords come out and remain somewhat waterproof. pretty sweet! oh, and he also made a temporary boat stand. it'll do for now, but i'll go make a super nice one after i'm all done.
as for what i did yesterday. i finished installing the motors. but not really. that damn second motor is too high again so i have to redo it AGAIN! i'm so frustrated with the sucker. i also started outfitting the top deck. well, not really, i made a practice deck to be working on and made measurements and cuts into that so that i wouldn't ruin the actual deck. its mostly done so i have to go take the plunge and work on the real deck today. and then maybe i'll solder some today too. we'll see. i got up crazy early so i'll have plenty of time!
got some free manual labor from daniel yesterday. he fitted the new radio box to have the cords come out and remain somewhat waterproof. pretty sweet! oh, and he also made a temporary boat stand. it'll do for now, but i'll go make a super nice one after i'm all done.
as for what i did yesterday. i finished installing the motors. but not really. that damn second motor is too high again so i have to redo it AGAIN! i'm so frustrated with the sucker. i also started outfitting the top deck. well, not really, i made a practice deck to be working on and made measurements and cuts into that so that i wouldn't ruin the actual deck. its mostly done so i have to go take the plunge and work on the real deck today. and then maybe i'll solder some today too. we'll see. i got up crazy early so i'll have plenty of time!
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