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Have you ever observed a busy bar counter where the bartenders not only need to interact with customers while customers while preparing various cocktails but also have to open a bunch of cans manually in a short time? Have you ever experienced the inconvenience of a hand or finger injury/trauma that made the can-opening task opening task became suddenly hard? Whether you or your friends want to keep good condition of your vulnerable nailsvulnerable nails? The tiny can-open task is kind of bothering in bothering in many cases. To solve this, the automated robotic can-opener of our project with a specific linkage mechanism design is aiming to economize manpower economize manpower and make our lives much easier when dealing when dealing with those these dilemma conditions.
Problem Statement
The goal of our mechanism is to position the end effector under a tab on a can We need a mechanism that will locate the tab of a can and to open it with adequate force. The complexity of our design stems from creating a mechanism with determining the correct link lengths, angles, and angles force such that the mechanism’s mechanism's 'end-effector' motion will consistently locate translate and rotate to pull the tab of the can open. To achieve this motion we need the mechanism to translate horizontally and vertically to locate the tab. The end effector will need to rotate while translating to be positioned under the tab. To complete the desired motion, the mechanism will translate upward with enough force to open the can and return to our starting position. We cannot use simple joints use of simple joints is not suitbale to accomplish this task because we need our linkages to have enough compliance to achieve desired angles while maintaining structural integrity to lift the tab and open the can.
Mechanism
Our team has identified that an 8-bar mechanism, similar to a Jansen’s linkage, could be used to achieve the positional profile for this project. The Jansen mechanism is a planar combination of 4-bar linkages that involves the use of one motor to drive the position of the entire system. This mechanism creates complex motion from a circular input. These mechanisms are commonly used to generate walking motions. Pictured below is an example of a combination of 4-bars that we could use to generate the sliding mechanism to get under the tab of the can and then sequentially pull upward. We will edit the ratio of the linkages to generate the desired path profile. The end link will be pushed underneath the tab before moving in a semi-circular path that will generate a moment about the tab, pushing it upwards, before sliding back out from under it.
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