Claymore Posted April 3, 2016 Share Posted April 3, 2016 Marauder is a MechWarrior/Battletech/sci fi inspired build. The build consists of a welded steel frame, 3d printed parts and custom electronics systems. there's a 7 inch touch screen display that will show system temp data and hardware information, and a 4 inch display that will show atmospheric conditions. each screen is connected to an Arduino micro controller. I'm also building a duster system that will spray compressed air at key components when the system is powered off. even though I am using touch screens, I wanted to keep an analog feel to the system. toggle switches will control aux fans, led lighting, etc. and buttons will control the display modes and brightness. Its to early to decide on paint colors/patterns. system hardware is as follows: Motherboard: Evga x99 classified. socket 2011-v3 CPU: Intel i7 6 core, 5820k 3.3 ghz CPU cooler: Cooler Master Nepton 280L Ram: 32 GB Corsair Vengeance LPX ddr4 @ 2400 mhz SDD: 4x Samsung 850 evo 500 GB configured in RAID 0 Video: Evga GeForce GTX 960 PSU: Evga 1000 GQ 80+ GOLD 1000W my next post will be mostly pictures of the steel frame and some of the electronics as they come together. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Claymore Posted April 3, 2016 Author Share Posted April 3, 2016 alright. Today I finally put my 3d printer back together and am running a test print on my fan ducts. (my cat ate the wire harness for the printer.) while it does that, I figured I'd get some of my pictures uploaded from my frame build. I don't have access to any high end laser cutters or tubing benders or even a chop saw. everything was measured by hand and cut with a 4 in angle grinder. my welder is a gasless 120v welder (which all you welders out there know sucks for welding sheet metal). originally my cad files called for 1/4 inch steel for the frame and 16 ga sheet metal. realizing that 1/4 inch wasn't enough to bolt anything to, I redid the whole cad file for 1/2 inch. my local hardware store didn't have 16 ga sheets so I had to go with thinner 26 ga. which made the welding even more of a pain. it took me about a week to get everything welded up but the 26 ga sheet metal warped like crazy. I'm going to need more Bondo than previously anticipated. while welding the bottom sheet to the frame, I cheated a little bit. rather than clamp it every few inches to avoid warping, I pop riveted it together and then welded it. it seemed to work. you can still see some warping but not nearly as bad as some other areas. as far as the metal work goes, its about done. all I have left is to drill a few holes and bolt on the motherboard tray. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Claymore Posted April 12, 2016 Author Share Posted April 12, 2016 Its been a few days since I've updated my worklog. I've been working a lot on the electronics package for my build over the last several days. also I've also nearly completed my bondo work. so far, using a 4D systems 7 in touch screen and 4D systems VisiGeni software, I've designed my layout for my temp hud. I've refined the coding for the Arduino micro controller to display the temps from my temp probes correctly, and gotten all the buttons configured. It took a few tries to get it all right and looking good, but I think its finally where I want it. I cant post the code here due to its length, but if anyone out there wants a copy hit me up and I'll email it to you. my code is super inefficient, but I wanted anyone out there that's struggling to do something similar to be able to mod the code easy for whatever their project is. In addition to that, I've completed the coding for my self dusting system, designed the main board for it, and made a custom PCB. so what the dust system does is it powers up when the computer shuts down via a dp relay. it waits 30 seconds before allowing user input. this gives a small amount of time for everything to cool off a little bit. once the wait period ends, it watches for the arm switch to be active. once active, it watches for a button press. once the button is pressed, the arduino opens the connection on the computers power switch so the system cant be powered up during dusting (or 60 seconds after). then it actuates a servo in half second intervals several times. I don't have the can holder printed yet, so I haven't tested the throw or time on the servo yet, but should have that done by some time next week hopefully. I am running dangerously low on PET+ filament for my 3d printer and should probably order more soon. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
E x e Posted April 16, 2016 Share Posted April 16, 2016 that is some heavy duty work you got there mate, looking forward to see more Cheers Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Claymore Posted April 23, 2016 Author Share Posted April 23, 2016 its been about a week and a half and my build is plugging right along. I have run into a few hang ups though. I found out I'm not very good at doing bondo work and had a :) of a time getting everything flush. at this point, I've sanded and reapplied the bondo 4 times. also I made a huge mistake on some of my 3d prints. I reduced the thickness of some of my parts from 10mm to 3mm and forgot to change them back to 6mm. 6mm would have held for what I was doing, but 3 is just too damn thin. the part I did this on has to hold 2x 3.5 in bays and 3mm just wasn't going to cut it. luckily for me I always over buy my materials so I had some extra 16ga steel left over. rather than reprint the part to the right thickness, I made a steel plate that sits behind it. I ran out of PET+ before my new rolls arrived so I have been printing quite a few parts with PLA instead. my issue with PLA is that in a drafty basement, it tends to warp. I found an instructable on unwarping prints by placing them in hot water and it worked amazingly well. another issue I ran into was my duster PCB. my last post I showed some pictures of the bare PCB I had made. when I got around to putting it all together I found that my trace widths weren't quite up to par. I burned through most of them. I'm in the process of redesigning the board to be more rugged. I did finally get around to doing a bench test on a can of DustOff and some neoprene tubing. turns out a single can does put out enough pressure to dust damn near everything all at once as long as you don't put too big of holes in your line. I got the can holder printed so the next test with that will be with the arduino control system actually controlling it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Claymore Posted April 23, 2016 Author Share Posted April 23, 2016 my PET+ came! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Claymore Posted April 26, 2016 Author Share Posted April 26, 2016 My Cooler Master Nepton 280l finnaly showed up and its official. Its going to be a very tight fit. When i cadded this beast out i didnt really thing about line flexability. Only about line length. Im not sure im comfortable with "I'll make it fit," but thats exactly what i have to do. I re etched my PCB for my dusting system and all my other parts for it came in the mail yesterday. Tonight I'll throw it all together and hopefully get that bench test done that i thought would be done two weeks ago. Last night i soldered up all my sensors for my weather reporting system and started programming the arduino code. The weather hasnt been forgiving enough for me to finish my bondo work. Bondo does NOT hold up well to the rain. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Claymore Posted May 8, 2016 Author Share Posted May 8, 2016 once again, it has been a coons age since I've posted any updates. (actually, I'm pretty sure its only been a week, but it feels like a long time.) I re-etched the PCB for my dusting system and finished printing all of the components for it. which afforded me the opportunity to actually test fire the system. worked like a charm. not going to lie, I was as giddy as a 12 year old school girl about that. I wasn't confident that it would all work like I wanted it to. other than that, I've finished most of the 3d printing other than the second half of my backup drive holder and my fan covers. I'm attaching a picture of the front of the build all laid out. all of my arduino programming is complete and boards are soldered. I was hoping to have all the final prep done so I could paint it this weekend but the weather is still crap. bondo doesn't like rain. so of course, its been raining. there have been a few breaks which has allowed me to get some of the sanding done but I still have a long way to go. luckily my wife doesn't care if I do projects right in the living room, but I don't dare run the belt sander in the house. so the work is going slower than I want it too. everything in the house is now covered in a fresh layer of pink dust that's about the consistency of powdered sugar. P.S. it doesn't taste good. also ignore the mess in all my pictures. I don't know how to clean. actually I'm just lazy. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Claymore Posted May 26, 2016 Author Share Posted May 26, 2016 it's been two and a half weeks since my last update. I finished printing my fan covers (and the rest of everything else) and finished all of the sanding. the weather finally broke enough for me to start painting. so here's some pictures of my hanging paint farm! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Claymore Posted June 6, 2016 Author Share Posted June 6, 2016 I finally got the paint on Marauder! and then we washed it and started over. turns out that ink splatter my wife and I did as a test, looks better as a test than in actual application. took a few hours to strip it all off and repaint the damn thing otherwise it would probably have been done by now. after I finish up on here, I'll be back outside to apply the next coat of clear coat. coming soon, the finishing touches! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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