Does anybody have any experience using magnets in ant weights as weapon switches.

Essentially the thought is to attach a magnet to the underside of the flipper arm. Place some springs below the flipper arm and then place an extra magnet on a servo. Draw down the servo untill there is not enough magnetic strength to hold the flipper arm magnet and the servo magnet together and then the weapon fires. (The servo with the magnet can reach below the loaded point of the flipper arm)

Essentially would this work?
Are there significantly better methods to create an ant weight flipper?

actually sounds pretty cool, give it a go! those neodynium magnets are stupidly powerful and with basically no gap between em i think the concept would work in an ant, with some fiddling about

The magnets are really fragile tho
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www.demon50s.com - Minimoto parts
http://www.youtube.com/user/HyzerGlen - Videoooozzz

I've never thought of doing it like that but i think what your suggesting is a magnetic latch in essence.
if you tuned the springs and strengths right you could use the magnet to do all the work (ie compress the springs) then pull past a stop to release.

Only concern is your release may be a little "spongy" as the field decays.
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Mechanical engineers build weapons, civil engineers build targets

definately worth some experimenting with!

has many advantages over a mechanical latch but has its own set of disadvantages too
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<Patrician|Away> what does your robot do, sam
<bovril> it collects data about the surrounding environment, then discards it and drives into walls

I have been trying that here at work and it seems like it will work.
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Get Some!!!

Secretary of the Queensland Robotics Sports Club inc.

Alright, i've manged to get my hands on a handful of those neodynium magnets and some springs. If this works ill toss up some photos and then chase down some Ti for a flipper ramp.

Speaking of Ti, anybody know of a cheap source for a small piece of 1mm sheet, 6x10cm or so.

That would probably be me . I will have a look around to see what I can offer

Aaron has a surplus 1mm sheet
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Steven Martin
Twisted Constructions
http://www.botbitz.com

the other way to get Ti is from titaniumjoe.com
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<Patrician|Away> what does your robot do, sam
<bovril> it collects data about the surrounding environment, then discards it and drives into walls

Problem will be getting a magnet and servo strong enough.