forum.TeamFREDNET.org

by **tristancho** » Mon 2009 Mar 30 12:10 am

Well done Joerg!
Joshua

by **Joerg** » Mon 2009 Mar 30 12:04 pm

Here the promised clips:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bR4bHrvPmpQ

and

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IpFlujPIAa0

JÃ¶rg

by **scasey** » Mon 2009 Mar 30 12:23 pm

I noticed that in the second video that the front wheels are not rotating. Why is that? Is the rover dragging these wheels? Will this be a problem in accurately steering the vehicle?

SC

by **alexc** » Mon 2009 Mar 30 12:26 pm

Awesome

by **tristancho** » Mon 2009 Mar 30 1:50 pm

Cute!
I like!
Joshua

by **alexc** » Mon 2009 Mar 30 2:44 pm

Although I'm not blogging for Team FREDNET anymore, I can still bring your excellent work to front pages. Refreshingly steam-punk-looking :lol:

by **ryanw** » Mon 2009 Mar 30 6:21 pm

nice work Joerg!

by **Joerg** » Mon 2009 Mar 30 10:03 pm

@ scasey

You observed that right!
Due to the gears the wheels are "blocked" (the torque of the gears is higher than the friction between wheel and ground). This is not a problem since the steering torque is very high (relative to the rover mass and friction) and if steering is done whilst the wheels are turning this effect does not exist.

Anyhow the steering torque is now under one fourth of the nominal torque due to the low voltage of the controller 2V instead of 5V. The rover speed is five times to high and so the driving torque is one fifth (one tenth if you consider there are only two motors actually). The power consumption is about 2W for driving (maximum).

Thanks for the comments!

JÃ¶rg

by **Joerg** » Tue 2009 Apr 07 5:20 am

I am writing some code to control the WRV1 rover. The Parallax Propeller Chip will do an excellent job for this purpose. Based on my UMDL (Universal Microcontroller Development Lab;http://systech-gmbh.ch) modules I will have a simple platform to steer the vehicle via a RC unit.

The base is the earlier published control diagram:

Saluti

JÃ¶rg

by **ryanw** » Tue 2009 Apr 07 4:58 pm

hey Joerg,
Andrew and I have worked with Parallax boards on the lander, would love to see your pbasic code!
-Ryan

by **Joerg** » Tue 2009 Apr 07 9:56 pm

Hi Ryan

I am sorry, but I will use the Propeller Chip and the software is written in SPIN! The Propeller chip is very interesting, since you can handle different tasks in realtime, since this chip has eight processors built in.

See http://www.parallax.com/tabid/407/Default.aspx

JÃ¶rg

by **ryanw** » Wed 2009 Apr 08 4:02 pm

ahh yes, forgot about the SPIN language

by **Joerg** » Wed 2009 Apr 15 11:27 pm

The simple software for controlling WRV1 is running!

You may have a look at the hardware used for the development.

http://wiki.xprize.frednet.org/index.php/Portal:WRV1#2009-04-16

JÃ¶rg

by **tristancho** » Thu 2009 Apr 16 11:30 am

Very Nice!
Joshua

by **Joerg** » Mon 2009 Apr 20 10:46 am

The new Maxon motors are ready to be mounted!

http://wiki.xprize.frednet.org/index.php/Portal:WRV1#2009-04-20

JÃ¶rg

by **tristancho** » Mon 2009 Apr 20 4:58 pm

Joerg wrote:The new Maxon motors are ready to be mounted! JÃ¶rg

Happy Birthday, JÃ¶rg.
Joshua

by **alexc** » Tue 2009 Apr 21 12:29 pm

I updated the WRV1 photo album on Picasa: http://picasaweb.google.com/teamfrednet ... erVehicle1

(trying to work through the backlog of posting photos and videos on the blog)

by **tristancho** » Tue 2009 Apr 21 2:12 pm

Well done Alex!
Joshua

by **Joerg** » Wed 2009 Apr 22 12:02 pm

WRV1 is running R/C guided now!

see:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wmA8ghL6BAs&feature=channel_page

JÃ¶rg

by **alexc** » Wed 2009 Apr 22 3:22 pm

I think you had a lot of well deserved fun today, JÃ¶rg! It's awesome.

by **scasey** » Wed 2009 Apr 22 5:46 pm

I would agree - that's an awesome vehicle and a great video!

Congratulations!!

SC

by **tristancho** » Wed 2009 Apr 22 10:08 pm

It is amazing. The rover runs nice it will take 500 meters very fast!
Joshua

by **tobiokanobi** » Thu 2009 Apr 23 8:17 am

Very nice JÃ¶rg, very well done!

-tobi

by **Enric** » Thu 2009 Apr 23 10:09 am

That's cool!!!

We are expecting for new WRV1 "episodes". Congratulations.

by **alexc** » Sun 2009 Apr 26 3:22 pm

There is now a "directors cut" of WRV1's latest endeavor including some extra clips I received from JÃ¶rg and a strategy for detecting water on the Moon

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8F5PwtboiBQ

by **tristancho** » Sun 2009 Apr 26 4:21 pm

Well done!
Joshua

by **ryanw** » Sun 2009 Apr 26 6:25 pm

Nice work Joerg!
now u just need to put some solar panels, a wifi unit, and a camera on that!

by **Joerg** » Mon 2009 Apr 27 9:16 am

I have added now the ELECTRONICS section for the WRV1.
I think some people could see some interesting information there!

http://wiki.xprize.frednet.org/index.php/WRV1-Electronics

JÃ¶rg

by **tristancho** » Mon 2009 Apr 27 5:07 pm

The WRV1 portal is every time more complex. These are good news.
Joshua

by **Joerg** » Tue 2009 Apr 28 1:03 pm

Alexandru has again done a great work!

See the video here:

http://www.youtube.com/user/TeamFREDNET
or
http://www.googlelunarxprize.org/lunar/teams/frednet/blog/off-road-ride-with-the-wrv1-lunar-rover

Dear Alex thanks for the great work!!!

JÃ¶rg

by **alexc** » Tue 2009 Apr 28 3:31 pm

You're welcome and I'm glad you like it! It's fun to blog and make videos when there are great video clips to work with.

By the way, I have created some shortcuts URLs to the wiki that are easier to add and read in videos:
WRV1: http://bit.ly/wrv1
Picorover: http://bit.ly/picorover
Jaluro: http://bit.ly/jaluro
These point to the wiki pages.

by **scasey** » Tue 2009 Apr 28 3:32 pm

What about making this controllable over the net (i.e. remote operations)?

SC

by **Joerg** » Tue 2009 Apr 28 11:42 pm

Eins nach dem Anderen! (One step after the other!)

When the electronics and mechanics are done, WRV1 will be able to be controlled by commands and so we can do a network interface too!

Nur Geduld!

Saluti

JÃ¶rg

by **Joerg** » Wed 2009 Apr 29 1:33 pm

Some more infos here:

http://wiki.xprize.frednet.org/index.php/WRV1-Electronics#2009-04-27

JÃ¶rg

by **alexc** » Wed 2009 Apr 29 2:10 pm

Great, thanks for the info!

by **Enric** » Wed 2009 Apr 29 2:22 pm

I was seeing the video and I have a doubt, the WRV1 can detect water presence?

Also, congratulations for the work you are doing.

by **alexc** » Wed 2009 Apr 29 2:30 pm

Enric wrote:I was seeing the video and I have a doubt, the WRV1 can detect water presence?

Yes, the wheel slippage confirms icy snow

I'm not sure if this "proof" would be good enough to win the $5M bonus, though :lol:

by **tristancho** » Thu 2009 Apr 30 7:35 am

JÃ¶rg,
You are doing a good job. It is important have a well defined specifications and this is reflected in a good drawing.
Regards,
Joshua

by **Joerg** » Thu 2009 May 07 12:44 pm

News from WRV1

see the parts of the wheel gear boxes:

http://wiki.xprize.frednet.org/index.php/Portal:WRV1#2009-05-07

JÃ¶rg

by **alexc** » Thu 2009 May 07 3:21 pm

Looks quite awesome. Are you making those mechanical parts yourself?

by **tristancho** » Thu 2009 May 07 4:36 pm

Yeah, awesome!
Joshua

by **Joerg** » Fri 2009 May 08 10:37 pm

Since I seem to be one of the few lone fighter (> look at the 1% theory, somewhere in this forum):

Yes I do all the parts by myself! It is very helpful to be skilled in mechanics and electronics, enabling me not only do the theoretical part of a project. Since I was teaching CAD system (and a lot more topics) I notices that drawings and simulations are nice (and helpful), but the things are not really useful in the virtual word!

Conclusion:
Writing and drawing is nice, but we have to do HARDWARE also AND it is very helpful to have a practical knowledge with a large base (like you may get in an apprenticeship)!

So to the rater passive members of the forum: Help us in an active manner! We have a lot to do! AND YES, we can DO IT!

Jörg

By the way the new Forum look is nice, the best thing (as far as I discovered in the past 10 minutes) is the improver EDITOR!

by **scasey** » Sat 2009 May 09 9:36 am

We should makes sure that we enough people to support the WRV to push this forward for further proto-typing of additional required subsystems.

SC

by **tobiokanobi** » Mon 2009 May 11 1:31 am

Hi Jörg,

So to the rather passive members of the forum: Help us in an active manner! We have a lot to do! AND YES, we can DO IT!

I'm certain that I asked Dan (the ex-Rover Team leader) and you (the current Rover Team leader) several times where I can help the Rover Team before I started with Jaluro - since I actually think it makes much more sense if a group of people work together on one rover project rather to work as lonelonesome cowboy, especially since we have such a low contigent on (activ-) human resources. But I never got an answer on these emails. (Not completly correct, Dan said, the group needs help on mechanics side, and I agreed to help, but then I never got more info (and trust me, I ASKED)).

Writing stuff like the Open Task List (see wiki->organization) makes it possible to see people where they can help.

Just imagine how far we could be with the rover if you, Joshua (+ his excellent group) and me would have worked together on one project. (After a short discussion and a study (theoretical) which rover concept fits best for the mission).

-tobi

by **tristancho** » Mon 2009 May 11 6:06 am

I think so. In two or three months we have to decide wich will be the final definition of Rover/Rovers for Team FREDNET mission. Up to them we will working hard to give the best of us.
All of you are doing a very nice work in the size that each one can offer in its spare time.

Regards,
Joshua

by **Joerg** » Mon 2009 May 11 8:16 am

Hi

i think we did it the right way! Having now (more or less) three different types of rover, so we are able to compare the advantages (and disadvantages) of each system. it would not harm, if the teams where a little bigger and if we would have been able to interchange parts, developed by the partner team. That wa the idea of parallel development.

Thanks to all for all the effort done until now!!

Jörg

by **Enric** » Tue 2009 May 12 2:17 pm

The work we have done with rovers development is fantastic! Surely, we will do a better job working together, but before the final design must be decided. We are approaching to our goal.

Enric.

by **hugo.fonseca** » Thu 2009 May 14 6:35 am

I'm sorry for the perhaps "foolish" question, but watching the video the Rover looks very light and fast, in the Moon, will be a lot lighter and faster ... will it gain friction against the moon surface or could he just keep its wheels spinning without moving, or could it jump of the ground? will it take a lot of weight on top?

Anyway it looks fantastic, great job.

by **Joerg** » Thu 2009 May 14 8:05 am

Hi
the actual state of WRV1 is based on the material I had in the "box", the planned version just growing out of aluminum and stainless steel has fout 0.75W Maxon motors with a 275:1 gearbox (actual 45:1) so the rover will drive much slower; about 2m/min. So It will drive in a save and lowest power manner!

Thanks for the compliments and keep watching !

Jörg

by **Joerg** » Thu 2009 May 14 12:42 pm

Here the result of this evening turning event!!

No Tobias it seems only to be a part of JALURO!

http://wiki.xprize.frednet.org/index.php/Portal:WRV1#2009-05-14

Saluti Jörg

forum.TeamFREDNET.org

WRV1

great!

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