I’m building a robot with a mechanical arm that rotates. I need this arm to hit a tennis ball off a set location. I am debating using the HS-805BB servo motor from Hitec and need further input if this setup could work. Thanks for any input.
-UF Student
A normal RC servo would certainly not appreciate a sudden impact force like that, and despite the 805 being a quarter scale, it still might break.
To get the force and speed you need to hit a tennis ball, you might need to choose pneumatics, since any strong force on a rotational motor which does not have a clutch might cause issues.
To confirm - do you need the robot to hit a ball or to launch one? We have many requests for tennis ball launching.
To confirm, hit the ball and thanks that helps a lot
Then yes, in all likelihood a sudden impact in the opposite direction of the motor may cause damage, so unless you are prepared to do a number of tests, we don’t suggest going down that path.
As indicated, a pneumatic setup should be sufficient to give you fast motion with enough power to hit a ball. The setup is quite a bit more complex, requiring a source of air (compressed air tank and air compressor, tubing, valves and actuators, as well as a microcontroller and power). Determining the best position for the actuator itself (as part of a mechanical system) will also be important for the speed and impact force.
robotshop.com/en/pneumatics.html
Ex: robotshop.com/en/basic-penum … =RB-And-48
robotshop.com/en/100mm-doubl … RB-Mab-126
robotshop.com/en/12v-double- … =RB-And-95
We can certainly appreciate that the cost and complexit is a lot more than a simple servo, but fear the servo approach will result in many broken products with a short life span.
This having been said, as with any design, there are likely many other potential approaches, but this should be reliable. Think about test equipment for baseball bats, tennis and badminton rackets etc.
