Day #4748 (Thu., Jan. 5, 2023) – The DC Motors Arrive!
As I was picking Bobby up from the line at 2:40 pm this afternoon Mrs. Nelson, the school counsellor, popped her head into the Camry to introduce herself and say hello. She told me that they took the job of Bobby’s teasing very seriously and that they would deal with it. Nice to hear.
The kids had viola/violin class after school today. While they were away I took the opportunity to sweep the pavement in the front yard, where Bobby and I “dealt with” the old computers by smashing them into little bits. Those little bits were everywhere, and it took a while to clean them up and throw them into the trash. Was it worth it? I think so. Bobby said it was the 2nd greatest day ever, after horseback riding… 🙂
Katie showed me the new riding boots that came in the mail. The instructor told her that it would be better for her to have a boot with a heel when she rode a horse.
Just before they got home I got into the package of DC motors and accessories that came in the mail.
- I started off by creating a little prototype to show Bobby how the various wires and things worked and how the electricity ran through the motor (Image #1).
- We then hooked it up to one of Bobby’s Lego cars (Image #2). It would not budge it! There was a note on the Amazon comment section that the power from the motor was not enough to move a car, and I guess they were right. No problem! Time to improvise.
- I told Bobby that the problem was there was probably not enough energy to turn the wheels, so why not try adding an additional motor (Image #3). Still no luck.
- At this point I thought water would have even less friction, so we tried to create a boat (Image #4). This would have worked, but the weight of the battery and motor and such started to sink the boat.
- Well, how about a bigger boat (Image #5)? This worked. The little fan was able to push the boat from one end of the sink full of water to the other end.
- So, we surmised that the problem was too much friction in the wheels. Why not try creating a cardboard car and use the axels and wheels that came with the kit. Sounded like a good plan, but there was still too much friction between the axels and the carboard for the tiny little fan to move the car. On our final attempt we made the carboard as narrow as we could. Ahah! This was able to move the car, but the wheels were wobbly.
- So we added some of the black tubing that came with the kit to provide a barrier between the wheels and the carboard (Image #6). This worked great! We were able to send the car flying from one end of the hallway to the other!
- The last trick I showed Bobby was to turn the propeller around so that it was actually pulling the car instead of pushing it (Image #7). This provided much more stability in regards to direction.
Bobby enjoyed this little project so much that he wanted to take the car to his room. I told him that we would work on hooking up all the motors on a bigger car, perhaps his “carboard limo” next! This should be fun.
I put Bobby to bed this evening as my wife was helping Katie with her homework.