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I am writing to ask for some simple knowledge or suggestions, that is all.
I am charged with leading a team of five 5th through 8th graders in building a battery operated vehicle for the Odyssey of the Mind competition. My job is to provide information to the kids to enable them to solve the problem. Our problem is the electric vehicle problem. It has to have one driver that steers the vehicle while riding on it, at least three wheels, and may not touch the ground other than the wheels.
We are allowed to use commercially produced parts, however, it must include one or more integral parts that are not commercially produced to perform the function it serves as part of the propulsion system. For example, for this integral part we can use a fan motor because propulsion is not a fan's commercially produced function.
It will have to ride back and forth a 24 foot long course a few times during the competition. In other words, it doesn't have to go super fast or be that fancy, it just has to work.
That's where you come in. I really don't have much knowledge about how vehicles work. I saw this video on youtube
www.youtube.com/watch
so I kind of understand that I need a motor to turn a gear that's connected to a belt or chain that's connected and turns the axle. But i learned that today. I am somewhat mechanically inclined but the kids really need to do the building, not me. Like I said, I just need to show them stuff so they get good ideas. Please help. Below are the battery specs we have to work within.
The batteries we are allowed to use are:
Unmodified, commercially produced sealed batteries: Zink-Carbon, alkaline, lithium, nickel-cadmium, and nickel-metal hydride.
Prohibited battery types include:
Lead-acid, zink air, mink-mercury, silver zink, metal chloride.
May group cells together to form higher voltage or currents.
Commercially produced battery packs that fall within the approved battery types may be used.
Oh, and our budget for the whole entire project may not exceed $145.
Thanks so much for any help you may wish to give.
Sincerely,
Miss Denise
I am charged with leading a team of five 5th through 8th graders in building a battery operated vehicle for the Odyssey of the Mind competition. My job is to provide information to the kids to enable them to solve the problem. Our problem is the electric vehicle problem. It has to have one driver that steers the vehicle while riding on it, at least three wheels, and may not touch the ground other than the wheels.
We are allowed to use commercially produced parts, however, it must include one or more integral parts that are not commercially produced to perform the function it serves as part of the propulsion system. For example, for this integral part we can use a fan motor because propulsion is not a fan's commercially produced function.
It will have to ride back and forth a 24 foot long course a few times during the competition. In other words, it doesn't have to go super fast or be that fancy, it just has to work.
That's where you come in. I really don't have much knowledge about how vehicles work. I saw this video on youtube
www.youtube.com/watch
so I kind of understand that I need a motor to turn a gear that's connected to a belt or chain that's connected and turns the axle. But i learned that today. I am somewhat mechanically inclined but the kids really need to do the building, not me. Like I said, I just need to show them stuff so they get good ideas. Please help. Below are the battery specs we have to work within.
The batteries we are allowed to use are:
Unmodified, commercially produced sealed batteries: Zink-Carbon, alkaline, lithium, nickel-cadmium, and nickel-metal hydride.
Prohibited battery types include:
Lead-acid, zink air, mink-mercury, silver zink, metal chloride.
May group cells together to form higher voltage or currents.
Commercially produced battery packs that fall within the approved battery types may be used.
Oh, and our budget for the whole entire project may not exceed $145.
Thanks so much for any help you may wish to give.
Sincerely,
Miss Denise
posted by:
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Philadelphia
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Re: Dear Smart Car People,
Fri, December 28, 2007 - 4:38 AMWill you have access to welding services?
A group of kids from some school in Berkeley built half a dozen electric vehicles and followed me around at the "How Berkeley Can you Be?" parade a couple of years ago Their creations were great and showed much ingenuity.
Can't seem to bring them up on Google...
What is your primary purpose besides getting to complete this 25' journey back and forth a couple of times?
Speed?
Level of ingenuity?
If ingenuity is not paramount, you can get a retired electric wheel chair off of craigslist for about that price.
then use the parts to make a vehicle. Top speed +/- 5MPH.
Or buy components seperately which can run you some money. DC motors aren't cheap.
Here's a good deal on craigslist... but then you still need batteries and a car to put it all in.
sfbay.craigslist.org/sfc/pts...933.html
Feel free to shoot me an email with any questions you may have.
I have lots of experience doing this kind of stuff.
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Re: Dear Smart Car People,
Fri, December 28, 2007 - 11:02 AM$145 is really not enough, especially if you cant use lead acid batterys, can you use sealed lead acid? Sealed lead acid are very safe even if they are dropped run over or even shot (thats why the army likes them). Most of the batterys you listed that you could use are very exotic and thus expensive, the most common battery that you listed is the lithium battery and they one of the more dangerous if you charge them wrong unless you use the new lithium cobalt oxide polymer batterys, and those again are expensive.
I suggest starting with bicycle parts, get some wheels, forks, frames and some chains and experiment with a small recumbent bicycle that you can then add a small gear motor to power it. You can pick up small dc gear motors (under 200rpm) at www.surpluscenter.com/ Once you have figured out how to make the motor drive the bike you need some kind of controller, or just a switch that can handle the power that the motor puts out. This is all very simple stuff, found at urban ore and other junk shops. The jack shafts on you tube are a great way to add power to something that does not have it already.
good luck.
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Re: Dear Smart Car People,
Fri, December 28, 2007 - 12:32 PMFriction drive against a tire will be the cheapest drivetrain.
I would suggest a cheap cordless drill for power. You might need one with two gears, With a 1 or 2" roller, it should have plenty of torque.
Borrow a drill to find how much power you need before buying the wrong part. -
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Re: Dear Smart Car People,
Sun, December 30, 2007 - 8:28 PMR01,
I haven't had a minute to get to this post and during that time, my team of geniuses and I came up with your same idea.
I just bought the parts today, the initial trials will happen this Thursday.
I'll let you know how it goes. I'm a bit worried that the drill will burn out in the process but there's only one way to find that out isn't there.
Thanks Justin and the naked bacon cooker for your ideas too. Naked Bacon man, the primary goal is to complete an odyssey of the mind road rally during which the kids will complete in four sports related events. This portion of the task simply needs to work.
Thanks again!
Sincerely,
Denise
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