An RC Tank Chassis That’s Not Messing About

December 26, 2023 by Jenny List 3 Comments

It’s not uncommon to see a tracked robot build on these pages, but it’s fair to say that many of them are somewhat on the small side. That was where [iforce2d] started, but the idea of making a more capable version just wouldn’t go away. Thus, he’s come back and made what looks to be a very promising, fully capable outdoor RC tank chassis, one that, within reason, we think should eventually be able to go anywhere.

For plenty of power, he’s using a pair of hoverboard motors with a chain reduction drive and in turn, a couple of shafts to the tracks. The chassis is a TIG-welded aluminium affair, while the tracks are an early incarnation with machined MDF drive wheels and a homemade tread. The suspension is a work of machined-aluminium art, though, and while there are teething troubles as he takes it for a spin, we can see plenty of potential as its deficiencies are ironed out. Take a look at it in the video below the break.

If large-size R/C tanks are your thing, we have another for you to look at.

Continue reading “An RC Tank Chassis That’s Not Messing About” →

Dad Builds Frickin’ Tank For His Son

February 3, 2023 by Anool Mahidharia 25 Comments

We gotta love hacker Dads and Moms for being so awesome. Sooner or later, their kids get to play with some amazing toy that every other kid on the block is jealous of. [Meanwhile in the Garage aka MWiG] is one of those super hacker Dads who built a frickin’ Tank for his son (video, embedded below.). But it’s so much fun driving that beast around that we suspect Dad is going to be piloting it a lot more than the kid. The tank features metal tracks, differential steering, a rotating turret, periscopes and a functional paintball gun with camera targeting.

Building a tank, even if it’s a mini replica, needs an engine with a decent amount of torque. [MWiG] first tried reviving an old ATV engine, but it did nothing more than sputter and die. It went to the scrap heap after donating its rear transmission and axle. [MWiG] managed to get an old Piaggio scooter with a 250cc / 22 hp engine. The scooter gave up its engine, electricals and the instrument cluster before being scrapped. Looking at the final build, and the amount of metal used, we are left wondering how the puny 22 hp engine manages to drive the tank. We guess it’s the right amount of gearing for the win.

Continue reading “Dad Builds Frickin’ Tank For His Son” →

Rover Uses Different Kind Of Tracks

July 22, 2021 by Danie Conradie 7 Comments

Tracked robots usually require at least two wheels inside to work properly. However, [James Bruton] discovered a curious tractor design from the 1940s, the Fordson Rotaped, which only uses a single sprocket wheel inside each track. Being [James], he built a self-balancing robot around the rotaped concept.

Instead of a lot of short track sections, the Rotaped uses six long sections of track, about the same length as the wheel’s diameter. To keep the track on the wheel, a series of chains or an oval frame is used on the inside of the track.

As is usual for [James]’ projects, most of the mechanical parts are 3D printed. To hold the tracks in place, he stretches a bungee cord loop around three points on each side of the track. To make things more interesting, he made the robot balanced on the tracks. This took a bit of PID tuning to get working without oscillations, since the wheels experience a slight cogging effect inside the tracks. The wheels are driven by a pair of brushless motors with O-Drive controllers. The balancing is handled by an Arduino Mega, which reads processed position values from an Arduino Pro Mini connected to an MPU6050 IMU.

This might be a viable alternative to conventional tracks for certain applications, and the reduced part count is certainly an advantage. Let us know in the comments if it spawns any ideas. [James] has previously built another tracked rover, which uses flexible 3D printed track sections. By far, the biggest 3D printed tracked vehicle we’ve seen was [Ivan Miranda]’s ridable tank.

Continue reading “Rover Uses Different Kind Of Tracks” →

Should I Use Wheels Or Tracks?

February 26, 2021 by Lewin Day 32 Comments

When it comes to dominating offroad performance, many people’s first thought is of tracked vehicles. Bulldozers, tanks and excavators all use treads, and manage to get around in difficult terrain without breaking a sweat. Today, we’re exploring just what makes tracked vehicles so capable, as well as their weaknesses.

It’s All About Ground Pressure

The various parts of a tank’s propulsion system.

Let’s first look at how tank tracks work. There are a huge variety of designs, with differences depending on application. Different trends have been followed over time, and designs for military use in combat differ from those used for low-speed construction machines, for example. But by looking at a basic tank track design, we can understand the basic theory. On tanks, the track or tread itself is usually made up of individual steel links that are connected together with hinges, though other machines may use rubber tracks instead. The tracks are wrapped around one or more drive wheels, often cogged, which directly pull on the track. On the bottom of the vehicle are the road wheels, which ride on top of the track where it lies on the ground. The weight of the vehicle is carried through the road wheels and passed on to the tread, spreading out the load across a broader area. Outside of this, the track system may also have one or more idler wheels used to keep the track taught, as well as return rollers to guide the track back around without touching the road wheels.

Continue reading “Should I Use Wheels Or Tracks?” →

Tank Track Skateboard

December 25, 2020 by Danie Conradie 8 Comments

As electric skateboards kits and components become more commonly available, you really need to do something different to make your custom board stand out. [Emiel] [The Practical Engineer] has managed to do this by building a half-track skateboard. (Video, embedded below.)

Except for the front trucks, fasteners and bearings, all the mechanical components on the board were custom-made. The sturdy rear chassis and the track sections were machined from aluminum plate, and the wheels and track linkages were machined from POM/Delrin. The large carbon fiber deck and the polyurethane pads on the tracks were custom molded, which [Emiel] covered in detail in separate videos, also below. Two beefy brushless motors drive the tracks and are powered by LiPos in enclosed in the sheet metal electronics box. The final product looks very well-built and refined, especially considering most of the work happened in a tiny 2 m x 3 m workshop.

It looks like the board handles gravel paths well, but we would really like to see how it performs on soft surfaces like sand, where even off-road skateboards can struggle. It struggled a bit with low RPM torque, so a slight gearing change is in this board’s future.

Everything is cooler with tank tracks. If you’re willing to live with plastic tracks, 3D printing is a viable option, as demonstrated by [rctestflight]’s tracked rover and [Ivan Miranda]’s tank skateboard. Continue reading “Tank Track Skateboard” →

3D Printed Tank Tracks

March 31, 2018 by Al Williams 10 Comments

[Ivan] has been keeping his 3D printers busy with parts he’s experimenting with to build a tracked motion setup for a tank-like vehicle. His design uses several interlocking parts, so if you want to duplicate it, we hope your printer calibration is up to snuff. He’s still printing more parts and promises to release the files once the design proves out.

However, you can see he’s off to a good start. Small pieces fit together and accept a piece of filament as a sort of hinge. Some pins keep the filament from working out. Pads fit into the main parts and hold down with zip ties. The whole flexible tread locks into sprockets and a groove on a drive wheel.

Continue reading “3D Printed Tank Tracks” →

TrackRobot Sports Welded Steel, Not Plastic

February 18, 2018 by Donald Papp 15 Comments

Don’t let the knee-high size of [Hrastovc]’s creation fool you. TrackRobot weighs in at a monstrous 60 kg (130 lbs) of steel, motors, and battery. It sports two 48V motors in a body and frame made from pieces of finger-jointed sheet steel, and can reach speeds of up to four meters per second with a runtime of up to an hour. The project’s link has more pictures as well as DXF files of the pieces used for the body.

Currently TrackRobot is remote-controlled, but one goal is to turn it into a semi-autonomous snow plow. You can see TrackRobot going through its first steps as well as testing out a plow prototype in the videos embedded below.

Continue reading “TrackRobot Sports Welded Steel, Not Plastic” →