Whisper - 150g Antweight Combat Robot

Where did Whisper come from? https://criticalrole.fandom.com/wiki/Whisper

Components

Note: As always, links are apparently notorious for not working, Google is your friend :-)

3D Print Files: Bot Chassis - https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:4297430

Hubs & Wheels - So I got several sets of these when I placed my first order for bot parts. Little did I know at the time the motors would be so slow. At least now I get to use the wheels. Wingoneer Motors and Wheels

Motors: Endbots N20 Microgear 30:1 

ESC's: These are two way so I no longer need an additional mixer. By the way, I have really liked using these. 5A ESC Brushed Speed Controller Dual Way Bidirectional ESC 2S-3S Lipo

Receiver: Flysky FS-GR3E 

Transmitter: Flysky FS-GT2B

Battery: Turnigy Nano-Tech 300 mAh 2S 7.4 35-70C Lipo

The Build

By this time, I have built several bots so this one didn't take so long to put together. Needless to say, I have had the print ready to go and, as it seems, I was just waiting for parts to arrive. I have some parts that I ordered (at the writing of this) two months ago, thinking I would try a less expensive route and still have not seen them. The amount of time and the stress of feeling like I have to check the tracking codes daily has not been healthy for me. You all may not have that problem but apparently I do. Especially, when orders do not arrive by the estimated arrival date (ok, enough on that rant and back to the build). 

The other fantastic thing about this build is that I somewhat know my way around a soldering iron and finally feel like I can use it and not burn the ever living skin off my fingers. 

So jumping right into it, I started by cutting the speed controller motor wires down so that I didn't have too much excess before they were soldered to the motors. 

I stripped a little plastic off of the ends using a gift from my bachelor party over thirteen years ago. Oddly enough I had never had a need to use it until I stared building bots.  

For the vast majority of people who may read this, I imagine that much of what I share in this build report will be very basic. And, in the off chance there is someone out there who is like I was a few months ago, I am going to be as detailed as possible. After stripping the tips of the wires, I added a little solder to the ends to help with soldering them to the motors. Important note, the red wire goes with the connector next to the + sign. And the black wire goes on the other side. 

 

Note: the white blob of stuff that I am using to hold the wires and the motor in place is a tacky substance that is/can be use to hang pictures on walls. I found that it was super helpful for holding wires in place and took the place of needing a third hand. 

Now that I had the wires connected to the motors I bound the receiver to the transmitter. 

I am using a FS-G2B pistol grip transmitter. 

A FS-GR3E receiver

 To bind the transmitter and receiver, insert the bind cable (it should look like a black loop with a flat end) into the third slot on the receiver. Plug in the black ESC connector making sure the white wire is on the left based on the orientation of the receiver below, and then plug the battery into the ESC (making sure that the wire colors match black with black and red with red). 

Now the receiver is all set to bind to the controller. Next, open up the top lid of the controller, hold down the bind button, and turn on the transmitter. The light on the receiver will be flashing and when it turns a solid color the receiver will be bound to the controller. 

After I bound the receiver and controller, I unplugged the battery, unplugged the bind cable, turned off the transmitter, then turned it back on, plugged the battery back in and tested to see if I was receiving a signal. Here is how that turned out. 

Now that I have things working, I am going to add a switch so that I can power the robot on and off without having to unplug the battery. 

 For this part of the build, I am going to use heat shrink tube to insulate the cuts and solders that I will make. 

Next I cut the red cable and striped the ends off and added a little solder. Then I striped the ends off the switch as well. The switch I am using is repurposed from older parts (specifically an older ESC that I used in the Brenatto build). 

Then I cut a couple of pieces of heat shrink and slid them on to the wires and then solder the wires together. 

There are a couple of different ways to actually shrink the tube to hold it in place. I have seen people use the soldering iron (and I can't seem to get it right). I personally use a heat gun and that seems to do the trick for me. 

Not it is time to test the switch, so I plug the battery back in and give it a go. And so far so go, I didn't blow anything up and everything seems to be in working order. 

All of these components now have to go into the chassis, so I started the process of gently figuring out how to make it all fit. Of course I did a preliminary jamming of the parts into the bot and was able to do so with out the wiring. Now, to make it all work with the wiring and all. First I mount the motors to the chassis. I found that it is easier to get the screws started on the outside of the bot and then tighten them down when inside the bot. 

Once the motors were in place the rest of the build was just delicately inserting the electronics, mounting the wheels, and test the bot. 

As you can see, everything seem to fit fairly well. the battery sits in the back, the esc in the front and the receiver in the middle. I was surprised at how well everything fit. I used some Pololu wheels to get things up and running. 

So here is the bot running with the Pololu wheels. And, as of the writing of this post, the Wingoneer wheels have been fitted to the bot. 

The final weight of the bot is 138 grams. So conceivably I could use the less exposed lid and still be under weight. But for now, this is Whisper. If you made it this far, thanks for reading and I hope you found it interesting if not helpful.