Status on yellow robot arms?

Those robot arms have been sitting there for a while. Last forum post i could find was over a year ago. Are we still planning on selling/donating them? I am interested in messing with them on an atomic level, i.e. replacing the drive electronics and controller since they’re 21 years old, but I doubt that’d fly without buying them from the space or reaching mutual consensus. And I don’t see a science committee meeting or a robotics sig meeting anytime soon.

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I think someone mentioned an ongoing project to get them functional in this thread:
https://talk.dallasmakerspace.org/t/discussion-about-the-robot-arm/73320/40

It says that page doesnt exist or is private for me

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To sum up, back in July @FairieCyanide was wanting to get rid of them but @kobin was the incoming chair and needed to make the decision.

Since then… well… Covid. Perhaps one of them will chime in.

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We were going to get rid of the Staubli arms, but they are probably the coolest things we have at Makerspace.

Both of the Staubli RX60 and RX60L arms work with the original CS7 controller but the controller is old and difficult to use. I’ve been working to build an open source drive called STMBL v4.1 that will run gcode:

Next steps are to order up some populated PCB’s and mount the motor control chips I just received. Currently working with @Team_Machine_Shop and @Chris_Wischkowsky to find some floor space.

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Excellent ! I would like to learn how those work.

There’s lots of interest but few volunteers. We’re barely in the “getting it to work” phase, much less the " teaching classes on it" phase.

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I have plenty of thru-hole soldering experience and some surface mount.

nearly 30 years in the electronics industry. I “speak” C and LabVIEW.

I should have some time to help over the next couple of months.

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Great! Any help on the arms will be appreciated

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If science does go down the new controller route etc (which I think is the only reasonable way to use them, though daunting) metal can provide some leftover frame steel to make a proper stand.

However a place to run them safely is a concern; they really need an enclosure or cordon to run safely.

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I was going to ask you Jim to make a stand during the next “scrap metal throwaway” meeting in metal shop…beat me to it lol.

Surely it’s own cordoned off space is necessary, especially if we attach a router bit or something to the fun end. Will have to work with the board and machine shop on that one.

I’d really like to get the arm to work but not with that 21 year old electrocution box, of which i noticed we only have one. Stmbl looked cool but does it handle driving motors? Or just control? Ive been developing my own universal motor driver board (sort of like the odrive but works for any type of motor and handles more power) for high current applications like this. Regardless, since we only have one controller, can we treat the other arm as a rebuild project? BLDC servos might do it good, although i havent seen the inside in person

From what I understand the arms don’t take that much power and we can run them on a 208v (with transformer) or maybe even the standard 110v outlets as long as they’re not running 100% full speed. RoboDK or LinuxCNC software will control them via the STMBL drives (need one drive per axis).

Feel free to stop by the Science area today around 2:30 to discuss further in person.

Just saw this, not gonna be able to come to the space today, sorry. Wish I lived closer

Same here. Not going to make it to DMS today.

The gist from that thread is that the arm is extraordinarily dangerous and we should sell it or donate it. There’s finer points but you can read those when you get access. I think the conclusion they came to at the time is still the correct one.

A robotic arm would be a neat tool to have access to but I think it’s beyond what we can realistically support given our current culture and organizational structure.

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Looks like it can handle 320V motors. To the tune of 30 Amps.

I feel we should put up with this thing, regardless of whether it is dangerous.

We have a right to bear arms.

I’ll walk myself out now . . . .

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