Hercules 1997
    Designing & Building

    The Design...

    Hercules 1997 was my first attempt at a combat robot. I felt good about the design, but lacked some of the skills and materials to make things work the way I wanted, but went for it anyway. Here are some of the details on the design of Hercules I:

    Hercules was built with two strong aluminum boxes cut into a 'wedge' shape in front and back. There is about a 3.5 inch wide gap between the boxes that is the section for the flipper arm to move through. Steel pipes hold the two sides together. Each side has its own motor and wheel. The motors are some surplus 48v DC motors pushing almost 1hp each. Unfortunately, due to time and space constraints, I was unable to do the proper geardown on these, so I had to run the motors direct drive to the wheels. The drive wheels and tires are 8 inch diameter wheels from a motorized wheelchair, and are inflatable and strong. These provide excellent traction and steering capabilities. I was pleased with these wheels and would recommend them any time-although they were not cheap. The speed control is also one area I didn't want to cut corners... I bought a Vantec RDFR series speed control to hook to the Futaba radio reciever. I would definitely recommend these Vantecs! They save a lot of time, and in the long run, is well worth the price you pay. By my estimates, over half the robots at Robot Wars were using Vantecs.

    Hercules used four 12v 12ah batteries to power the drive motors and the weapon systems. One big problem occurred after the first battle disaster, due to a massive attack by the most destructive robot there (Blendo), my Vantec was shorted out and I had to rush and build a homemade speed control. To fit the makeshift control into the already-packed robot, I had to pull one of the four batteries out, so instead of the intended 48v, Hercules was running at 36v, and barely half the speed he was designed to for the remainder of the event!

    The main weapon for Hercules '97 was the flipping arm. On the front, a flat steel flipping arm is powered by a very high torque 12v DC gearmotor further reduced by a chain drive and sprocket assembly. At the shaft, the motor is rated at lifting 1500lbs! With the arm attached, Hercules is easily capable of lifting a 200lb robot off the ground! The flipping arm has almost a 270 degree turning radius, so not only can Herc flip over other robots, but he can flip himself back over if he needs to! (This came in very useful during one of the melee events!) The arm can go almost all the way back over the top, and straight down- if I ever need to.

    On the other end, Hercues had a 5300rpm dual-shaft motor that I can attach different blades to. I even created a double chain-flail attachment! I have synthetic diamond wheels, metal cutting blades and other weapons of destruction for attachment to the motor. The arm that the cutting motor is attached to can swing upward if it gets hit, hopefully eliminating the possibility of a shattered blade. The sides, top and underside of Hercules are mostly aluminum, with stainless steel plates in key locations. Hercules '97 had armor all around. Even the wheels were protected on all sides but the actual drive surface.

    Every robot starts with an idea, and Hercules I started from some parts that I had already obtained, so I basically built the robot around what I already had.

    I did some of the layout design on the computer, making sure that all the parts would fit in the space that I had.
    I designed Hercules I with the ability to flip himself back over if he needed to. This short animation shows how Hercules was to be able to use his flipping arm to right himself when upside-down.

    Hercules was built from two heavy aluminum computer cases, I had to cut them into two wedges and fit them together so that the flipper arm could swing between them.

    I started with very few tools, a drill, a grinder and a jigsaw were my main tools. Here I'm cutting the shell for one of Hercules' sides with a jigsaw.
    I did all my work on Hercules I in my living room. Boy, aluminum shavings are hard to get out of carpet!
    Hercules front armor taking shape, with the lifting arm in between the two sides of the case.
    Sizing up the rear armor plate for Hercules.

    Here you can see Hercules in early development. You can see three of the four batteries I had to cram into the case. and, yes, this lovely carpet is in our living room/my workshop....
    I used several 3" steel tubes to fasten the two sides together. 3/4 inch bolts with heavy duty washers and nuts hold the tubes in place.
    Boy, it sure got cramped in there fast!
    Here you can clearly see the gearmotor drive system for the flipping arm. The chain drive proved to be very effective and extremely strong. In the background, you can see the two green 48v motors used to drive Hercules, along with the inflatable wheelchair wheels and tires. These tires were GREAT!
    The side of Hercules where the lifter motor was needed to be reinforced because of the tremendous forces of this gearmotor. I had to add an extra steel plate to the bottom to keep the case from bending.
    Here's another picture of the wheels I used on Hercules. Pneumatic wheelchair wheels/tires! Very nice.
    A peek in the back side of Hercules. I used metal plumbers tape to hold down the batteries. This worked out fairly well.
    Adding on the finishing touches, I realized that Hercule might be vulnerable if some robot flipped him onto his flat sides, so I added on a couple of bolts sticking out and sharpened them into spikes, so that he wouldn't have any way of resting on his side.
    Cleaning up those rough spots is a cinch with a disc grinder.
    Here is the logo I came up with for Hercules for the event. Thanks to Mark Malabuyo at ILM for his help on this!
    Here he is! Hercules, all done at last, and ready to head off to battle!
    Another picture of Hercules after completion.
    Not a bad looking robot for my first time!
    Here's a shot of Hercules in 1997 looking his best (before any of the matches) Note the new steel armor plates on the front.

    On to Hercules' first battle -->