Hi
I have found a really great program for altering .csv file exported from Visual Sequencer. The program is called Killink CSV whitepeaksoftware.com/killink-csv.aspx, it’s a simple spreadsheet editor. And you can easily copy and paste from MS Excel to Killink and then just save the file. The Killink “save as” function support comma , tab, pipe and semicolon !! delimited cells.
And the price was not so bad either…
Hi all roboteers!
I have been playing a bit with my hexapod and I have a dream of making her legs with FSR sensors. Have just started to get known to the Parallax Propeller chip. Hopefully it will have the power and multitasking abilities to do all the calculations. I think the clue is to figure out how to make a balance gesture engine (yes, I’m thinking of hexapod 4b micromagicsystems). But I think it will be a hard way to go, maybe too difficult for me. 
Anyway I have a hope. Here is a little movie of Phoenix playing with a box. Only sequences, sadly not sensors. Yet…
awwww 
She didn’t like the box? I liked the box! How come she didn’t like the box?
You have a very cool dream 
Let us know of any progress!
What servos are you using? It moves nice and smooth and I like the video, it was very interesting and entertaining.
Pay attention boy 
First you question how he cut it. Now servos? He said what servos he is using on the first page. About the 8th post.
For the lazy:
Hi!
I have been playing around with some cheap high torque MG microservos since I’m thinking of maybe making a small octapod sometimes… 
But I discovered something funny while testing them on the SSC32, normaly when you are sending pulses (0,5 - 2,5mS) that exceeds their limits they just stop turning, but these two bastards just kept rotating like a Continuous Rotation Servo. It was also possible to adjust the rotating speed. I was thinking COOL 
maybe this behaviour can be useful sometime ?! The potmeter used on these servo seemed to accept beeing rotated 360 deg. The servorange is about 750 - 2500 mS, it startet to rotate <750 mS.
Here is a little video of the phenomenon!
That is bizzare! I can see how this could be very bad if the servo is installed on a leg and is sent an incorrect value by mistake. 
You just found yourself some servos for a gun turret for Phoenix!
that is really cool. I could deffinately image this as a turret for a gun or a pan and tilt with 360 degree rotation. That is super cool, especially since the servo dosen’t have to be modified. That way it can be reused for any other type of project if neccessary 
I’m thinking Jim needs to bring back the Paintball turret hexapod project
On second thought, it would be a bad turret gun…
Tell the gun to rotate NW to shoot someone and it keeps going around and round… =/
From what you describe, it sounds as though the feedback pot was traveling to the end of its throw, hitting its endpoint stop, and then the output gear broke away from its friction fit on the shaft, and kept spinning. A friction fit on the feedback pot shaft isn’t all that uncommon in small servos, as it’s difficult to have a true keyed coupling in the limited space available.
It isn’t the same model, but this micro servo is fairly typical of the type:
http://www.rthtg.net/micro_servo/dissection_03.jpg
…where the feedback pot simply has a friction fit inside the core of the output gear:
http://www.rthtg.net/micro_servo/dissection_05.jpg
The nylon gears shown would most likely simply pop and strip under the kind of loads seen by trying to overrun the physical endpoints, but if the servo’s construction relies on the feedback pot instead of a mechanical stop on the output gear itself, and has metal gears that can deliver more power than it takes to get the output gear to slip on the shaft of the feedback pot, then I can see how you would get exactly that effect.
The bad news is that if what I think is happening actually is happening, then the more you overrun the endpoints and make it spin continuously, the looser the output gear will get on the feedback pot’s shaft, and the less precise and more prone to slipping it will become.
I should note that the molded nylon output gear pictured has a very large mechanical stop, but metal gears may not, since it takes less fabrication to mold a small complex shape like that in molded plastic than it is to replicate it in metal. Then again, without having a servo of the make and model that Zenta used, I’m just guessing.
I support your hypothesis. I was thinking the same thing, but didn’t have the time to illustrate it so concisely.
Wonderful pics Seamus! Did you get a manicure?
A+ to Seamus !
I opened them and that was exactly what had happend.
The sad news for me is that they are complete useless for robotics then 
I had received some “Bluebird” servos for evaluation that were supposed to be extremely powerful. The second I commanded them to an extreme end of rotation the thing self destructed. But this was worse than yours, the plastic case broke loose and the pot twisted the wires off the board and wrapped themselves around the pot. Power is useless if it’s not controlled.
I wouldn’t say “completely useless”. So long as you have software limits that prevent the servos from receiving a command that takes them to the “breakaway point”, they should behave just like any other servo. This of course assumes that you’re using servos with feedback pots that haven’t been ‘loosened’ by overrunning the endpoints too many times.
They’ll need a little bit of extra care in the programming department, but as long as they can provide the torque and gear train strength that you need, I don’t see why they wouldn’t work within their normal rotational limits.
Oh sure… try and tell Jean Grey that.
thread is project phoenix… unlimited power uncontrolled… x-men reference… 
Maybe “completely useless” was a overstatement. But if you unfortunately exceeds the limits you have to recalibrate every legs again 
So I would prefer servos with a mechanical stop.
zenta,
I just have to say that your hexapod is awesome! Did you really cut the parts out by hand?
