Update 4: MCM Assembled!

Today we finished assembling our most critical module, the MCM. Most of the manufacturing we did, aside from mounting all the parts, was turning the axle down to the appropriate radius. This was tricky because our worm gear's mounting hole has a larger radius than the bearings used to secure it. This means that we needed to turn almost all of the axle down to one diameter (1/4"), with a small section in the middle a slightly larger diameter (5/16").

The way we mounted the motor and uprights was using the aluminum square tube stock and angle stock, and we secured everything using 1/8" rivets. To do this we used vice grips to hold the pieces together so that when we drilled the holes, they would be perfectly aligned.

Here is a video of the MCM in action:

Update 3: 3 Parts Manufactured

Today we had our three manufactured parts graded by our GSI. The three parts we manufactured were the two uprights and the baseplate.


The baseplate is from the 1/4" aluminum plate and will serve as the foundation for our project, which each module is attached to. The manufacturing for this part was extremely simple, we made one bandsaw cut to cut it down to the correct dimensions.


The uprights will be used to hold the axle that the gear is mounted to. We are currently planning on using epoxy to secure the axle to the uprights, and having the gear spin about the axle. To manufacture the uprights we used the rest of the 1/4" aluminum plate that was left over after we cut out the baseplate. After cutting them with the bandsaw, we used the mill to mill them to be perfect rectangles, so that when we mount them to the baseplate they will stand perfectly vertical. We then drilled holes for the axle in each upright.

Update 2: The parts arrive!

The Worm and Gear that we ordered from sdp-si.com has arrived. The pitch and lead angle are complementary so they fit together flush. We now need to assemble the rest of the MCM by manufacturing the baseplate, upright, and axle, and assembling them all together.



After receiving the actual gear, we began to visualize how our machine will actually look. Going over the dimensions of the materials we have and the parts we need to assemble, we believe that we should be able to assemble our project without a problem. The only potential problem we can see is attaching the motor for the rack and pinion which extends the arm. We will use all of our angle stock mounting the first motor (for the worm) and it appears we will need more to mount the second motor. We will be thinking about all the possiblities for the design in this upcoming week.

upadate 1

Our most critical module is a worm gear used to rotate the scoop. We've decided to buy the worm and spur gear from SDP-SI. Everything else will be manufactured from parts in our kit for this module (the aluminum plates, rod, square tube stock, planetary gearbox).

We will have to buy additional parts for the rest of our machine, specifically the arm. We're thinking of using a high carbon steel as the material. We also still have to find a way to mount our worm gear to the motor, but this will have to wait until we receive the parts. Once we get them, we can figure out the best way to attach everything together.

schedule

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BIG ARM SCOOP!

Our strategy is to use a big arm scoop to push balls into the opponent's side of the slot and play defense once in that position. A worm gear will be used to rotate the arm downward into our side of the slot and then the arm will be extended using a rack and pinion. Once at the bottom of the slot, the worm gear will drive the arm outwards, not only pushing all the balls over to the other side, but also blocking our opponents from scoring....ensuring our victory.