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Bull Construction: |
It all started in March of 2001. There was still snow
on the ground. I had always wanted to build a robot. The
closest I had ever come was with a Lego Mindstorms kit.
When I learned that a few friends of mine were talking
about building Combat Robots I was thrilled.
I immediately began going to their impromptu meetings
and started thinking of a design. We watched BattleBots
every week. Eric brought some tapes of the first season
to the house and we watched them. I remember thinking,
"This does not look that hard."
I bought a radio / receiver combo from Tower Hobby. I
played with the servos, it was cool. I bought 4 cordless
drills. The cheapest I could find at the local Menards.
I bought a 12v SLA battery from the local Fleet Farm.
I built the first prototype in less than 24 hours. I remember
calling Dick and saying "I'm going to have a working bot
by tomorrow morning." Dick was skeptical, but excited,
he loves to work on bots. He came over and with his help
we got a working prototype running.
It was nothing more than 4 cordless drill motors tie wrapped
to a piece of particle board. It could not do reverse,
but I didn't care. It ran and was very, very cool!
OK, concept had been proven. Next I bought 2 IFI speed
controllers and a mixer so I could add tank style steering
with reverse. I bought 2 more cordless drills and took
them apart and mounted the motors to the particle board
with muffler clamps, bicycle inner tubes, and duct tape.
A friend of mine has a metal lathe and made me some really
cool aluminum hubs for my wheels. They screwed onto the
drill motor where the original keyless chucks did complete
with a provision for the reverse threaded holding screw.
This was amazing to me. I had never done any work with
metal except for very thin sheet metal.
I mounted the battery and all of the controls on the top
of the particle board frame. It looked cool in a Junkyard
Wars kind of way. The antenna was held in the air with
a 1/4" dowel. I added plates to the base to weigh it down
like it would be in competition so I could get a good
feel of driving it.
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I then tried using the nicads that came with the drills.
It couldn't take a lot of punishment yet.
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  I
removed the nicads from the battery cases they were in.
I was having trouble with the antenna. |
Dick and I drew up a cad drawing and sent it to AP Laser
in Schofield, WI. Within a week I had a bottom of a bot
frame. I bolted everything to it. It ripped! I mean it
was fast. It wasn't full weight you see. It also could
not take a lot of punishment.
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  This
is a timer circuit that I was working on deciding how
I was going to safely quick charge my nicads. |
 Working
on nicad charging methods in the living room. I got in
trouble for that one. Notice all of the thermometers.
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I finished the rest of the cad drawings for the remaining
pieces and Dick cleaned them up and sent them to AP Laser
for cutting. We got the pieces again, within a week and
I took it all over to Dick's house and he welded it together.
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  Then
I had to grind it. Wow, what a pain. Nobody told me how
long that was going to take.
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  I
put pointed bolts out each end to keep weapons away as
well as remove the possibility of being stuck on your
side. Don't forget the spike covers for safety.
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  Nice
and shiny before the rust sets in
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It was done a few weeks before the competition. I spent
quite a lot of time in the driveway learning to control
it. |
All Dressed up and ready for battle at TC Mech Wars in
Minneapolis Minnesota.
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 Taking
No Bull into battle for the first time. Boy was I nervous.
I really appreciated the entire Killerbotics team helping
me out. This is at TC Mech Wars 2 in St Paul, Minnesota
at the end of May 2001.
No Bull took 4th place out of 22 lightweight competitors.
No Bull Cost to Build (excluding labor)
1 - radio / receiver combo - $150
6 - cordless drills - $240
2 - IFI speed controllers - 300
1 - mixer - 30
1 - chassis - $100
Roughly $820
No Bull Stats:
Weight: 52lbs
Size: 22"x19.5"x3"
Weapon: Rammer
Drive: Cordless Drill Motors
Voltage: 24V
Power: Nicad
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