Remote Control Question

coolwings

Good work!

Steering next I presume?

Bruthal

coolwings wrote: »

Steering next I presume?

Yes its working out well, modified the circuit a couple of times so all seems well with it now so its steering next alright,
The original forward-reverse and 2 speed is done with a special switch which the gear stick is attached to, so it was just a matter of
coming up with a way of doing it with relays, 12v car relays i used. 40 amp contacts in them. Ideal.

I will use a servo setup like the one in post #21, should work well with that as its a powerful one.

Bruthal

The dx5e radio will need a slight mod as well, i will put a 3 position switch onto it for the reverse-forward-forward speed2 selection. The 5th channel on it only has a 2 position selector. Probably use the elevator pot wiring onto the 3 position switch as elevator control stick wont be needed for the tractor.

Bruthal

Update to tractor RC conversion

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vOkWQXm-Pqw

syl77

Well done Robbie...
You will need to add traction control though

Bruthal

syl77 wrote: »

Well done Robbie...
You will need to add traction control though

Yes the lad sitting on it might help with that:)

It actually drives exactly as it would out of the box, except car relays now switching on the motors instead of the foot pedal.

coolwings

That's a good job Robbie. A sort of one-off project.
I'll bet you enjoyed figuring it out.

Bruthal

coolwings wrote: »

That's a good job Robbie. A sort of one-off project.
I'll bet you enjoyed figuring it out.

Yes it was an interesting one alright, just about done now, just put some fuses in to protect control circuit, and a relay so if the 5v power to the radio receiver is lost the tractor will stop. And tidy up the temporary wiring.

It was some crack converting the steering servo to have a potentiometer outside it instead of the one inside it (external pot goes on the big gear of the gear box as seen in post #21), i burnt out the voltage regulator when tested the servo. At first i thought it was the servo motor because i had a gear inside the servo not sitting right when i re-assembled it which jammed it. All working well now though.

Bruthal

syl77 wrote: »

Well done Robbie...
You will need to add traction control though

Now you have me thinking. I might incorporate a brushed speed controller as well, for variable throttle, instead of the 2 fixed speeds it came with, but still have the 2 speed selection too for high and low. And see what happens.

Bruthal

Here it is with a brushed motor speed controller added to the setup. Just about finished now after receiving the steering servo etc last week.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=44O0be0-_mA

DublinDilbert

That's excellent well done. the speed controller seems to give it a nice gentle start too. It sounds like its re-gening the motor too which is good.

Top notch!

coolwings

It looks much better with the variable throttle.

Bruthal

coolwings wrote: »

It looks much better with the variable throttle.

Yes the way i had it is the same way they come, 2 fixed speeds using series-parallel switching of the 2 motors on back wheels. I still have that but now with the brushed speed controller. So it has variable speed and dual speed. With 2 motors in series for lower speed, the motor on each back wheel acts like an electrical differential, slow one wheel and the other speeds up. So the low speed setting is better for manouvering etc.

I might post some photos of the steering setup later today.

mtierney5

One Happy Boy!!!

mtierney5

I'll try and get a video up later!

Thanks again Robbie, your a legend!!!

mtierney5

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qFUf0VsfysQ

Plug

mtierney5 wrote: »

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qFUf0VsfysQ

He's loving it, fair play to Robbie for sorting it out. Now to hitch up the lawnmower on to the back of it!

Bruthal

Photos of the steering servo and linkages setup used for the tractor.

fergal.b

mtierney5 wrote: »

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qFUf0VsfysQ

Great job he looks to be enjoying himself, I also have a disabled son and is just learning to use a joystick for a motorised wheelchair, it might be worth thinking about adding one for your son and let him drive and you could take over if he get's into trouble , he seems to have a lot more movement and awareness than my son and it would be a great way to get him started.
Best of luck.

mtierney5

fergal.b wrote: »

Great job he looks to be enjoying himself, I also have a disabled son and is just learning to use a joystick for a motorised wheelchair, it might be worth thinking about adding one for your son and let him drive and you could take over if he get's into trouble , he seems to have a lot more movement and awareness than my son and it would be a great way to get him started.
Best of luck.

Oh ya! Never thought of that! Ummmm.... Oh robbie.....

Bruthal

Now look what you started fergal:D

fergal.b

robbie7730 wrote: »

Now look what you started fergal:D

Oooops sorry, But I am sure you love it, You do great work and I am sure you could make a living doing jobs like that for other kids. This is a video clip of my son on a moving base that his school had alone of they cost €5000 and it had to go back because of the cut-backs so he never got to use it again:( in the clip you can see the joystick or you can also use 4 buttons or get it adapted to any part of the body that the child has a bit of control over. just click the pic.

Bruthal

fergal.b wrote: »

Oooops sorry, But I am sure you love it, You do great work and I am sure you could make a living doing jobs like that for other kids. This is a video clip of my son on a moving base that his school had alone of they cost €5000 and it had to go back because of the cut-backs so he never got to use it again:( in the clip you can see the joystick or you can also use 4 buttons or get it adapted to any part of the body that the child has a bit of control over. just click the pic.

Yes we are talking about the joystick idea already now, its a great idea and i can see him looking into what we can do with it. That moving base would of been interesting to look at how they powered it, did you or they get to use it for any length of time?

fergal.b

It was only in the school for a week so not as much as we hoped. There is also a senor on it that can follow the strip on the floor, you can lay the strip around the house and the child just has to use forward and backwards and it won't hit off the walls as the child is learning.
It had rechargeable batteries not sure what type.

Bruthal

Yes could be lead acid battery or the lithium ones, i use a lot of them myself in the electric rc aircraft.

Bruthal

Just an update on the tractor above, as i have it back to try fit an onboard joystick setup on it which can be used to drive it when a switch is switched on the radio. So with the switch one way the joystick on the tractor will operate it, and switch it the other way and the radio takes back over. Its like a sort of wireless buddy box setup


So for anyone interested here is what i did with it so far. Its an interesting one as it involves the putting together of some PWM generator circuits and a receiver operated switching circuit, which can be very handy for rc applications.

Plywood arm to fit joystick to.


Frame to mount stick in, which will be a stick removed from an unused radio.


Stick fitted to test. And a 9 pin D sub plug(casing not fitted yet) and socket used to make it easily removable.



The main works of the setup, 2 PWM generators using 555 timer chips and a radio control switching setup which i put together on some vero board.

Bruthal

The finished Joystick setup.

fergal.b

Great work Robbie I'm sure he will get hours of fun out of it. I hope they post a video of him using it I love to see how he is getting on. If he hasn't got much dexterity in his hands it might help to drill a hole in a golf ball and put it on the joystick.
Keep up the good work.

Bruthal

fergal.b wrote: »

Great work Robbie I'm sure he will get hours of fun out of it. I hope they post a video of him using it I love to see how he is getting on. If he hasn't got much dexterity in his hands it might help to drill a hole in a golf ball and put it on the joystick.
Keep up the good work.

Yes I think we have mentioned a golf ball alright when he was collecting the tractor. I left it as is for him to experiment with various items on top of the stick. He has a t shape piece on it at present, left free to spin, i think, to see how he gets on with it. I was just texting him, so im going to put a short video up that he has made. I might say to him about the golf ball again.

Worked out well anyway, radio has a switch now that can switch control from the radios 2 sticks to the tractors 1 stick, with leds on radio and tractor, which ever is in control is flashing.

Bruthal

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SuJZ2pNYCis