Robotics Education & Competition Foundation
Inspiring students, one robot at a time.

Linear Components Upgraded

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DJ_Dooley
Entry ID #: 6891
Created: Mon, Dec 16, 2019 12:37 PM


Coming Soon Sneak Peak - We will be improving upon the linear slide tracks as well as the inner and outer acetal slide trucks 

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   DJ_Dooley on 01/12/2020

For some reason my description was not updated when I edited it but here is a recreation of it: The linear slides that vex produces have always been known for having problems, most notably when weight is applied to it. They are usually flimsy and have excess friction. We aimed to decrease friction, weight, and increase strength by designing a new part. This new linear slide can be used in any type of linear motion. Some examples would be on a cascade lift or on a wheelie bar. Tower Takeover is a game based around stacking cubes. With a large quantity inside your robot, it is very easy to topple over due to it being topheavy. That is where the wheelie bar comes in. It assists the robot from falling and in some cases can provide extra stability. Having an improved linear slide would drastically increase the performance of wheelie bars. When designing this part we used Autodesk Inventor 2020 Edition. We were already familiar with Inventor because our school offers drafting classes in which we design parts for a grade and other projects. We used the software to design the part and print it out in order to see how it would actually function in the real world.  We will definitely be using Inventor in the future because of multiple reasons. One it's accessible for everyone and simple to use. Second, it allows you to create anything you need, for example, a mock-up of a new design, a functioning prototype, etc. The biggest thing we took away from this project is tolerances. Tolerance is a space between parts that are needed in order to work. 3D printers don't always print your part 100 percent correctly so that space is necessary if you want your parts to fit together. This was important for us because when we printed out the parts the first time they wouldn't fit because the tolerance was too small.  This software can be used on a competitive robotics team even if we can't use printed parts. It is possible to draw your ideas in inventor to see if they would actually work before you build it which can save a bunch of time. This software will definitely help us in our career paths because most engineers use some sort of 3D design software when creating and testing.