Project finished (re-opened due to malfunction, finished again)
This is a turbot loosely modeled after Tilden's Turbot 2. It moves by making somersaults/turning on the spot. The gearboxes comes
from a McDonalds promotional toy. Modifying toy gearboxes is quite...labourous to use a mild term. They still jam occasionally, but what can you expect for 1$? Making a turbot is however worth your time. They are really interresting to watch as they tumble around against the light. Originally the bot had a suneater 3/4 combo for brains, but when it stopped working due to some unknown factor, I replaced it with a suneater 5. At the same time I rebuilt the bot with a more compact layout. Since the gearboxes aren't that good, I had to wire a couple of electrolytic caps in parallell with the dynacap to overcome the high internal resistance of the dynacap when the motors start up.
Now it works like a charm.
Here are some pictures of earlier layouts:
If you're interrested in how a turbot of this type moves:
And finally the modified suneater circuit:
Specifications:
Capacitors: 1 47000 uF Dynacap + 2200 + 1000 + 440 uF electrolytic
Motors: 2 FW11 pager motors with modified toy gearboxes
Cells: 2 33*22 solarbotics suncerams in parallell, one on each side.
Solarengine: Suneater 5
Sensors: dual photodiodes
Construction time: To long...
