Vagrant gets more competitive
Vagrant began life as a simple pair of servos held together with elastic bands. This proved to be uncomfortably close to the size limit for antweight robots, as well as using more of the 150g weight limit than it could. Clearly some way of reducing the size footprint and weight of the servos was required.
The two Acoms servos first had all extraneous plastic removed, leaving them as just gearbox housings with motors and control boards protruding from them. The control boards were separated from the motors by short lengths of wire and the gearboxes were glued back-to-back to rigid plastic sheets which would become the chassis. This left a space between the motors ideal to take the Varta NiMh cell. The servo control boards were mounted under the gearboxes and the whole unit then formed a compact and robust self contained drivetrain. With the Acoms receiver losing its case, the total weight of the robot with wheels and battery but no armour dropped from 165g to 118g.
Next step - create lightweight but robust armoured shell.