Hexapod racing sim

incredible, congratulations!

Thanks all for the positive feedback! Indeed we engineered and made everything mechanical ourselves including screen mounts. Big thumbs up to @Thanos and @pmvcda for their electronics and amazing software, and of course all of you for your enthusiasm, knowledge and inspiration! Couldn't have done it without! Indeed we can make more from now on, although I'd hate to be banned here for unauthorized promotion so I'll contact the moderators first.

Shakedown done, actually not really any issues. Some details like cable routing which can be a pita for any project but its not bad I think: not too cluttered and accessible. It also functions properly, however regarding settings we are not there yet. We are now working on a baseline and will posts video later for you all to bash on

Still wait a video

Nice build . FI, If you do have ideas of commercializing, you could have your thread moved to the https://www.xsimulator.net/community/forums/commercial-simulators-and-peripherie.52/ area on the site.

Hi ,

What's news ? We never see your rig in action !!! Is it possible to post a video ?

Thanks

Exactly what happened, and rightfully so. I will post updates for those interested starting off with the promised video. Corona hit me and my engineering company particularly hard, which is the reason I didn't post/reply anymore as I had other priorities like feeding my family Things are fortunately look less gloomy now so its playtime again!

The video as requested can be found

as requested and apologies for the delay. https://trsimulator.com/?page_id=743

Hello, a very nice project! Is it possible to find out the name of the AC servo motors and where you bought the AC servo motors with AASD15A drives?

It's similar to what I read on the website and I want to know how many watts the beast has when it's fully loaded.

Well, the AASD-15A servos are rated 750watts (each) in full load (max static load), but they can peak up to 2Kw for short periods.

In my case when racing it draws around 200W all together and it peaks to 500W in extreme cases like a crash, so the motors have an easy life. I can imagine if you dont have crash filters, make larger swings and/or use a larger pitch on the spindles this can be more.

Nice design

I noticed the seat has a pitch-up atitude with the rig in its neutral position. I guess this is intentional? (Formula-style seating)

Also, are you concerned with the clearance between the pedal-mount and the forward actuators? It looks like this will be the most restrictive point during yaw motions. Are you implementing something like virtual fencing to prevent collisions, or are you confident that this is not going to be an issue?

Are you using the stock cables that come with the motors, or are you gonna replace them with sheilded ones?

And since you are going the commercial route, are you providing any certificates of comlpiance with European standards?

Sorry for that long list of questions
Cheers,... Dirty

- Indeed the pitch up is more F1 style, this neutral position can be modified in mover
- During yaw movements the frame remains quite far away from the cylinders, in this picture it looks closer then it is. We verified the whole range and it remains ok.
- We didnt shield the cables, it doesnt result in problems. Replace the cables it a tremendous job, so we are looking to buy the servo/drive combo shielded or use shielded sleeves.
- We are in the process of CE. All looks good, except EMC which is not surprising. So one way or another shielding is necessary.

Hi @Petertje,
you wrote something interresting regarding a pitch-setting in the mover interface: "Indeed the pitch up is more F1 style, this neutral position can be modified in mover".
Pls. could you tell me how exactly this is done? This is a feature I was always looking for!
Thanks!
Wickie

Cool! Thank you very much for the lightning fast response.

I was concerned for the yaw, because this is a case where an exceedance can seriously damage the rig. On other DOFs it is only anoying when you run into an actuator limit, but yaw can actually break stuff. In my software I am cautiously contemplating to use a virtual fence to prevent damage, but that is still a long way ahead.

From a mechanical engineering perspective, I think you guys really nailed it there. Together with @PeterW's actuator, I think this is hands down the most solid construction. Some striking similarities btw It seems great minds really do think alike. Welded steel, milled aluminum, powder coated,.... awesome!

One thing raised an eyebrow: Are you guys sure that 250mm/s is fast enough? Especially on such a big diameter rig? I have started out with SFU1610 (~480mm/s) and am now even building with SFE1620 (850mm/s). It's not that you would ever need an instantaneous 850mm/s, but on long moves I have indeed reached the 480mm/s ocassionally.

I wish you guys good success with this. Keep us posted here how it goes. I am totally eager to hear your perspective of all of this.

Cheers,... Dirty

Hi Wickie, this can be configured in mover under "rig" tab using "driver pose"

Thanks for the kudo's! what I did is frankenstein together the cylinder based on stuff I found here, and stuff from my experience based on hydraulics/pneumatics.

250mm/s seems indeed not so fast. I was worried about this myself. For racing actually this is plenty fast, and I once hurt my neck from a unexpected crash resulting in the rig jumping Took me a couple of weeks to recover and since then I have a crashfilter cinfigured, haha!

Also depends on your purpose. I can imagine that on a flight sim setup with large pitch and roll movements there is need for more speed. But the sway surge heave can be really aggressive during racing.

For racing you can do arcade style with larger movements which is good for demos and gives a fun experience. For feedback meant to improve laptimes I prefer smaller detailed movements, and large movements only cloud that feedback and interfere with driving. Try monaco with large movements and you'll know what I mean

Hello Petertje,
I tried to contact you via the Trsimulator website and Phone number. They don't seem to work anymore.
I finished the build of my platform and was thinking of hiring you for the setup of the software part, Flypt, motion controller and the games. Could you please get in touch with me?

Hello Petertje,
Hope all is well, any updates on the dimensions of the rig or the actuator designs that have been corrected "to implement lessons learned"?

Thanks