#I want it to have a proper rocker-bogie and strain wave gear reducers

[debris-field]

i love this video so much:

powered by the sun and sheer force of will, using a little autopilot and GPS module, this rover was instructed to follow a short 8-shaped path in a field. The thing has a 3D printed drivetrain. To make it more efficient, it drives very slowly using small motors with a high reduction ratio. No fancy suspension; just one motor per wheel.

This rover follows a set of GPS waypoints. It has solar panels and a charge controller. At night, it drives until the battery voltage drops too low, and then waits until the morning.

why was this made. why is this soo good. There's a hecking STORY here. You get to watch the rover drive through time as parts wear down and the sun moves along the ecliptic. Lets go through it!

Its first runs were without panels. The previous version had a controller tuned much hotter, and with its improved gearboxes, it needed to be toned down:

That stick in the back holds the GPS module. its back there to try to reduce interference with other parts of the rover (motors etc.). Without it, it doesn't know where it is!

Note that the gears are not fully enclosed: this orange cover allows grass to get in. that's not ideal!!

But it continued! the outline of its periodic 8-shaped journey around the field began to make itself visible.

It also began to accumulate slugs whenever it stopped to charge. if any of them were unlucky enough to lie on the gear teeth when the battery level of the rover rose to drivable levels, they became lubrication. poor things!

Daniel left the rover to its own devices for some time. here's an image of it in the center of the field, showing the pattern it formed in the grass:

On the 28th, it had its first failure:

The back wheel had stopped spinning! and we get to take a look inside the gearboxes.

So much debris had accumulated in the gearboxes that mycelium started growing in them. wild!!

The rover stopped driving because one of its gears had fused itself to the walls of its gearbox.

With upgraded gears and gearbox covers, the rover was placed back into the field. Each wheel hub eventually broke and were replaced by versions with more material around the shaft.

When the days were sunny and clear, the rover never stopped driving. It kept its batteries full and continued its march around the field. It kept moving as long as it could!

When suddenly, one day:

The GPS mount was severely damaged, and the GPS vanished! the rover made its way to the edge of the field, far away from the mission, and had been damaged. The rover's ESCs were sounding, so it hadn't been driving for a while. Very strange!

The next day, with a new GPS and mast, it was up and running again.

The rover continued to follow the mission for quite some time. Here's an image from August:

The rover's battery was upgraded to keep it a little safer.

As the earth moved around its home star, the rover began to receive less sunlight each day, causing it to drive less often. The sun moved lower and lower in the sky until, on the 29th of September, Daniel thought of a plan.

"I'll give you a hint; it involves ailerons."

The next day, Daniel added some more area to the rover's solar panels with his old solar plane's wings. Janky as hell! but it seemed to work! The rover was now collecting much more power. Daniel hoped that this would allow the rover to "drive through a lot of the night now."

But, on the next day:

It somehow got off course?? Daniel hypothesized that it could have been because of the increased GPS position error due to the current solar storm. Interesting stuff!

After it was freed, it continued its circular journey.

The days flew by with some events. Sometimes the rover would get itself stuck in the grass. The gearboxes would get louder, but would always quiet down after some time. The trailer fell off, but the rover kept on going. Only when plants got stuck in the machine did the rover stop moving forward.

Its trail through the field became more and more defined:

But the days kept getting shorter, and the days more full of weather events. The trailer, being made from literal wings, did succumb to the wind a few times.

On the 18th, the trailer was cut loose, as the wind had damaged its wires after it had been flipped over. But it kept on going!

The days got gloomier. The rover's battery was manually charged a few times to keep it moving.

Hilariously, the rover's path it had engraved into the field had also been engraved into the imagery of Bing maps, as displayed on Daniel's Herelink:

Absolutely beautiful.

As time went on, the rover's battery needed to be swapped constantly; the sun wasn't high enough in the sky to keep it at a high enough voltage to keep it moving.

The waypoint mission had slowly been drifting towards the south. Mission Planner, a program used to view Ardupilot telemetry, showed that the rover's heading in software was different than its heading in hardware, which may have contributed to this trend.

And thats where the mission was cut short. By December 11th, the rover had driven this mission for months, and all the motors were still running, but without an ability to run with regular power from the sun, its goal wasn't being met.

"I feel like I just euthanized my dog."

The rover had been through the ringer and came out mostly unscathed. It didn't end up completely destroyed, it could have kept on driving! what a glorious machine.

He then opened up the gearboxes and assessed the damage. I won't post a string of images about it, watch from time 30:03. There's grass growing on the thing!

I love this video so much. I grew attached to this wonderful little thing as it continued to drive itself in circles with its brightly colored wheels and rusty steel frame, GPS haphazardly stuck on its rear. It just kept on going, all on its own. It needed some help, but it always seemed to try its best, even when the compass lied to the autopilot, the wind blew off the trailer, the brambles grasped it and held it down, the GPS was torn off, and the sun drew lower in the sky. It kept on driving as far as it could through the day and night and as Daniel's other projects took flight and were made into their own videos. I love that rover so much, its so fucking adorable!!!

This is what made me purchase my own autopilot and slap it on my old RC car. It could drive wherever I pointed on the map, just like rctestflight's rover. When I can get my hands on another autopilot-enabled craft, I'll be exceedingly happy. because look at that thing. its so cool. look at him!!!

ardupilot freaking rocks.