Dome Drive / Pittman Motor

Tonight I’ve started to work on some dome stuff, including the dome drive system which has been bugging me for months.

I’m using Darren’s dome drive kit (based on Atomic Pickle’s) and it uses the Pittman GM9413-2 geared motor. Spec’d at 12v, 19.7:1, 142RPM.

To me it seems sluggish and rotates slowly compared to a lot of other droids I’ve seen, especially when I change direction. It could be the weight of the dome, which is around 17lb with all the accessories. Including all alu parts, like HP’s, surrounds, radar eye, dome ring, and periscope, plus the batteries, smoke/fire-extinguisher etc. etc. But I’m sure I’m not the only one with a heavy dome.

I’m wondering if others are experiences sluggish domes who are using this Pittman either from Darren’s kit or from AP’s? Especially if your dome is heavy?

According to the GM9413-2 data sheet on the AP site, the motor is rated at 12v, which is what I’ve been running it at, but on the motor itself the label says 12/24v.

I’d rather not run it as 24v if I can help it – but if it would help I could re-configure some of my batteries as a last resort.

The only other thing I can think of is the slight sagging in the mounting, but the motor is making full contact with the rockler bearing. Maybe it’s not doing a great job of holding on or maybe pushing too hard against the rockler bearing?

I know many Sennaites are using the Saturn motors at 24v for the dome, but I’d rather not switch class of motors right now. I’ve posted to the Yahoo! Group to see if anyone has some suggestions specific to the Pittman motors.

Edited to add some videos. Here’s the Pittman running at 12v directly off a battery, no speed controller so startup is instant and it looks okay right now which I don’t understand. I’m wondering if it’s a speed controller issue, or maybe even a problem when he’s angled in 3 legged mode. mmm.

And here it is running at 24v – super fast I know, but I’d rather the top speed be fast and I can slow it down with the transmitter/speed controller commands.

Now to troubleshoot why the 12v spin seems okay.

I did some further testing tonight, and held the body at an angle while the dome spun. Man, is there a lot of force whipping around while it turns, even at the slower 12v. I can feel it struggle on the up swing as the two heavier side of the dome comes around. 24v helped a lot but I need to go back and put the speed controller back in the loop to confirm my test and see how snappy it is looking left and right.

Posted by Chris on December 4th, 2007 in Dome, Electronics | 3 Comments

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