Again, thank you for all the feedback, it’s clear you know what you’re talking about. With all these limitations you mention, it seems like the “perfect” crawler is almost impossible, it’s all a game of balancing the pros and cons. Our fully internal design and front-mounted camera keeps everything protected, lowers the risk of getting stuck, and makes flipping a non-issue. However, the camera can’t pan left and right (but zero-turning the crawler is very easy to look left and right), and there is no suspension. We weighed the options and made the decisions we did based on feedback from home inspectors whose biggest fear was losing their crawler under a house.
We design and fabricate our crawlers 100% in-house, here in Laramie Wyoming.
The way I went about it was to decide that the imagery supports the Inspector, the camera and lighting supports the imagery, and the rover supports the camera.
It had to be done in reverse. A failure at any point stops it all.
Considering all that could defeat a rover, I went with 4 wheel steer and 4 wheel drive from the start. Any problem that is caused by the operator that could be minimized by the design as dealt with, within reason.
The inherent weaknesses of each platform laid out before me made it clear. Each TYPE can lay claim to dominance in particular scenarios. But only live axle machines, driven well, can perform satisfactorily in a broad range of them, meeting the most needs. If not, I’d have gone another route.
Same for me. This style chassis can go and do way more than the others can.
Takes a lot of design work to make that happen of course. The boxes cannot compete.
I looked at the website pics. The carry handle is a nice feature. Allows easy deployment.
I noticed that the body is 3D printed. Is there anything preventing creating an upside down V hull for more ground clearance? I know it’s designed to run flipped, but that should be a recovery mode…. Normal orientation should provide the most clearance possible. Not knowing the inner layout, maybe that isn’t an option? Are the wheels belt driven?
Are you running a RunCam 2 inside it?
You may find that PETG can warp in hotter climates…. PCCF, ABS or ASA might be a better choice.
Your web site does a nice job of showing the features and answering most questions.
We’re glad you took the time to look at our website!
That is an interesting idea I will look into.
Each wheel is powered by its own motor.
It has a Runcam 2 4K inside it.
The glass transition temperature of our PETG is 180° F, meaning it maintains its strength until it reaches that temperature. Black cars in Pheonix usually don’t even get that hot. We also paint all the 3D printed parts with bed liner making them much more scratch and impact resistant. We actually just recently came across a heated chamber that we plan to test our crawlers in high temperatures. We will post the results of that once we complete some testing.
Thought I’d hop in and bounce off Brady a little bit about no crawler being the best. You have to admit, live axle crawlers are more difficult to use when moving through rough crawlspaces. We have a number of home inspectors who previously owned crawlers very, very similar to yours, and who have moved to our crawlers due to the ease of use and peace of mind.
If you are a hobbyist that enjoys making and driving crawlers, more power to you. But from what I’ve seen, building crawlers is a very niche hobby that not many home inspectors are in, and most just want an easy to use supplemental tool for their crawlspace inspections.
Thought I’d throw in a little GIF of our “box” below.
Since I am getting called out, again, twice now actually, I will drop some knowledge on those in obvious deep need. This will require a few response because you clearly need it.
“You have to admit, live axle crawlers are more difficult to use when moving through rough crawlspaces. We have a number of home inspectors who previously owned crawlers very, very similar to yours.”
You are as far from right as you can be with that statement. Similar does not mean the same. If you are comparing a consumer built Danshee models with mine you are really off the mark. BarNone is 100% designed and built for one purpose, to access the tightest of crawls, go over what it can’t go under, get information and get out. It is also the easiest to use crawler I have made to date.
All I have seen of yours (and others) is DRIVING around a crawlspace randomly looking at items. Post of video of where an inspector ONLY used your model and then wrote a report from it.
Eeeeh, I dunno about the glass transition…. That’s a defined engineering point, but my experience with PETG is that it will allow warpage below that temp under certain conditions.
Those are:
Extended time near GTT…
Mechanical loading, even static, at that temp & time…
Infill %…
Thermal mass…
Thermal annealing (which tends to cause deformation anyway)
I hope you’ve worked those out. I know the higher temp filaments are more problematic to work with, but they do perform very well. ASA is the new ABS, and isn’t as hard to print to completion. Without fillers, you can still use a brass nozzle, but probably need an enclosure for the size parts you manufacture. With PCCF, you need a hardened steel nozzle, but the results are spectacular.
Chamber testing is cool. Real world testing is its hot cousin. I’d suggest this at least: place one in its case after using it. Set it in the cab of a car in full sun at 1000. Leave it there until 1700. It should be set on its side. Rinse repeat for 5 days.
At the end of that, take critical measurements and see if anything changes. Also check for square on any drive item in relation to parallel structures, and alignment with the centerline.
If it can pass with no deflections after a week of cooking, I’d say you found the sweet spot for that material.
Obviously, the bits that might complain the most will be thinner structures with some sort of angular load.
I meant this as a good thing! We ourselves started out as hobbyists driving RC toys as kids and now building FPV drones. I encourage everyone to make their own crawlers and show it to others. I just meant that not everyone wants to spend the time to build their own, which is okay!
We haven’t had any experience with crawlers built on Danshee platforms or other budget builds. We’ve had a couple professionally built crawlers sent to us. One of them was built on an axial rc car platform.
Nope, it is a box. Just a well-designed purpose built inspection box.
Outside of all this, I do want to ask - would inspectors here be interested in a budget, open source platform designed by engineers? We have been thinking of designing a kit for something similar to a Danshee or Axial platform.
We also paint all the 3D printed parts with bed liner making them much more scratch and impact resistant. We actually just recently came across a heated chamber that we plan to test our crawlers in high temperatures. We will post the results of that once we complete some testing.
