Week 9 - Mechanical & Machine Design

Tasks:
To design and make a "machine", including the end effector.

 

What's the inventory?
Material: tri-fold cardboards and/or 5mm plywoods, flanged nylon bushings (for tube with OD 3/8"), 2fts A6063 hollow rods
Motor: AQS Nema 17 stepper motor with in-built lead screw (4 starts-2mm pitch-OD8mm).
Electronic: Gestalt board.

This task is a GROUP project. The team has HENDRA, Steven Chew, Keith Tan, Teo Shin Jen, and Richard Sunga. The team has decided to build a machine has XYZ axes similar to those milling machine and has interchangable end effector. At the meanwhile, the end effector is to hold a marker or a pen.

 

Team Member Area of Responsibility(ies)
HENDRA Mechanical design of the structure and X-Y-Z axes, fabrication, and building it into XYZ machine
Keith Tan Mechanical design on end effector, fabrication and integrate into the XYZ machine
Steven Chew Electronic design, programming and control
Teo Shin Jen Electronic design, programming and control
Richard Sunga Electronic design, programming and control

 

This site describes the building of the 3 axes for the machine and the structure. They were designed with Inventor and the axes are modular and interchangable, the followings show the X/Y/Z axis module.

 

Highlighted Features are

1. The design and intended fitting are based on press-fit construction.
2. Double locking to prevent the structure from falling apart due to vibration.

3. Brass hexagonal thread inserts are used to reduce the wear and tear on the work placement plate (in this case, it is also made of plywood).

Assembled the axes module into the machine structure. The final assembly machine design is as the following. N.B. The machine structure is built using 11.6mm plywood.

Machining, Assembly, and Building The Machine

2D drawings with the necessary press-fit offset, quantity and layout were prepared. Epilog laser cutting were used to cut those 5mm plywoods whereas 2D router machine were used to route 11.6mm plywoods.

Finished laser-cut plywood for 1 axis module Assembled modules for XYZ axes Finished 2D routed and assembled plywoods as the machine structure X-Z axes module assembled onto the 11.6mm plywood structure. Front view (left) and back view (right) Assembled the XYZ axes onto the machine structure. Without work placement plate (left) and with work placement plate (right) Fully assembled machine with pen end effector MTM Video shows the 3 axes movements

 

Interested to build one for yourself? The working files can be downloaded here.