Group 25 Manufacturing and Assembly

As we described on the Design Process page, we used Linkage to aid in determining the necessary lengths of each link. Then, we designed the links in Retina Engrave according to these lengths and the diameters of the bearings and axles.

After assembling our first prototype using the links above, the table interfered with the motion of the bucket. To solve this problem, we simplified part of the mechanism to pivot the bucket around the edge of the table, rather than translating and rotating it, therefore avoiding collision. The link attached to the bucket, as shown below, was redesigned to move with a sliding joint attached to the output (Link 6) of the quick return mechanism. This effectively replaced links 5 and 8 in the image above, simplifying our original design.

For each stage in the manufacturing process, we used the Laser Cutter at UT TIW to produce our links and machine parts. Assembly along the way was tricky because it was difficult to create temporary connections between links, as the bearings would fall out of the links. We could not secure the bearings into the links yet, as we had not yet determined whether this was our final design. Once we had hammered out all the kinks and laser-cut the final link dimensions, we began assembling the machine, gluing bearings into links, axles onto gears, and sliding everything into place in our self-contained mechanism.