hi, i am looking at buying the al5d robot arm. looks great, but i am wanting it to lift much more weight. so i am looking at upgrading the servos. i am new to robotics, i am a hardcore overclocker and have pretty decent electronics knowledge.
so i have been browsing the servos on lynxmotion site, but with the different sizes and voltages i am a little confused.
so i need a little advice as to which servos to upgrade to, and am also wondering if the ssc-32 will support servos needing 6.0v to 7.4v.
i am wanting to be able to lift at least 2.5kg minimum. is this possible? would i need a better gripper?
also i would like to know how accurate these servos are for repeated movements.
Yes. You can have separate servo (Vs) and electronics (Vl) supplies by removing the Vs=Vl jumper, plugging a 9V battery into Vl and a separate higher capacity battery into Vs.
We are dealing with hobby grade servos here, and there isn’t one that is going to lift that much weight.
thanks mate, so if i have this right, the servos run off the standard 5v circuit power for the 4.8v to 6v servos
(i am assuming the ssc-32 uses 5v power)
so how much is the arm capable of lifting with the better servos available here?
No, the servos run off whatever power source you have plugged into the Vs terminals (with the Vs=Vl jumper removed). The Vs supply is passed right on to the servos. You would also need a battery (usually a 9V) plugged into the Vl terminals to power the electronics.
The majority of servos are designed for 4.8 to 6.0vdc, but no one uses them at 4.8vdc anymore. The new direction in servo design is to use 7.4vdc directly. Hitec is currently migrating their servos to 7.4vdc.
In order to make the strongest arm you need to use the most powerful servo, and the shortest segment lengths as possible. Our AL5 series arms were designed to provide a useful payload, by using more powerful servos as the arm gets larger. The AL5D is already using the most powerful servos.
There is no reason you can’t use a 9vdc wall pack in place of a battery.
thanks for the info robot dude. there was just one application i was needing more lift for, programming it to pour liquid nitrogen for computer cooling. so it would need to lift a coffee thermos filled with LN2 (about 1L)
i have many other plans too which dont require much weight, for example building model bridges with match sticks.
which brings me to another question: how accurate is the AL5D arm for programming repeatable movements? just so i have an idea of how precise it is and suitable applications (regarding construction i guess)
thanks again for helping
This one is the Scorbot, came out in about '86. I’ve just acquired one in a semi-working state. A few fixes, and I’m able to move the arm with a DOS control program running on my PC.
Pros: Increased accuracy and holding power, smaller deadband.
Cons: Increased cost and power consumption, may require a programmer to increase the range to 180 degrees,
Inexpensive hobby servos are not precision devices. Also their construction and operation may result in varying amounts of “slop” depending on how they are used and the load they are carrying. The high end servos would probably have better specs, but then you might have to pay $50-250 each depending on the brand.
