Final Prototype
Around 85% of the parts were machined manually in the UT Mechanical Engineering Machine Shop. The materials used were all 6061 aluminum, with a few steel rod ends and threaded rods, as well as nylon linear shaft bearings. All of the parts were obtained from McMaster Carr. The motor used is a stepper motor inherited from the previous design, which runs on a 48 Volt power supply.
The mechanism on the UGV. Only one side was made due to time and resource constraints.
Some takeaways from the project:
- A physical model allows better understanding of possibly hidden challenges in the virtual model.
- A greater room for dimensional tolerances have to be accounted for due to the experiences of students in machining. Considerable room for error has to be allowed since the machining was purely done by us, as compared to a professional machinist.
Future Work
The robot moved very well but quite slowly, so any speed or torque changes can be made with a gearbox or a motor with a different power. The motor attachment plate was made to accommodate such changes.
Besides, the links of the mechanism has to be redesigned to allow higher loads; currently it does well without loads, but flexes/tilts slightly when some weight is added to the coupler.