Hattington Link: A more reliable safety link for combat robotics

thingiverse

A system of securing a safety link to a robot combat that greatly reduces the risk of losing power during combat while adhering to FRA regulations! This means that this can be operated at any competition in the UK and Europe, and is significantly more reliable than prior solutions. For my latest Featherweight combat robot, I required a link that was detached from the path of the weapon, but also wanted to create one that was virtually failure-proof while fully complying with FRA regulations. As such, I started modeling a housing for standard XT60+ connectors for my plan. In the first two images you can see how everything comes together inside. The "body" holds the female end in place, which is then attached to the top plate of the bot using some bolts. Meanwhile, the "head" has a channel where the link wire can push down into to be flat with the top of the head. This is where the trick of the design comes in. When mounted onto the 10mm top plate and fully inserted, the head would be completely flush with the top of the machine. This way, I can have a door on top that can be moved by hand, but during combat, it should remain firm, preventing the link from moving upwards. Given its unusual design and resemblance to videogame character Hatty Hattington, I've decided to call this setup a "Hattington Link"! Finally, the door setup. It's held in place with a nylock nut underneath and a bolt at the front prevents it from feeding into the weapon. The door also won't catch on the wheels during normal operation, and there's plenty of room for the link cable to feed down. My bot uses 10mm top armor, but I've included variations to suit the following thicknesses: 1.5, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, 10, 15, and 20mm. Just find the relevant .stl for your top armor. The link cap should be universal. I've also included an LED holder (or as I like to call it, a backpack) that I use to hold an LED taken from a disassembled Argos drill used for drive, and that can act as a power light for the robot (as seen in the fourth image).