Gantry Crane

Last year for the Curtin Robofair Brett had gantry crane working based on two winches. While functional the device could have been larger, worked in THREE dimensions and be enclosed in laser cut acrylic. So for this year's Robofair a few of us decided to implement these improvements. Unfortunately for Brett most of the skills reside in his brain, so he is the busiest with implementation.

Designer, Machinist, Coder & Funding - bdowning - he started this projected and much still resides in his brain.

Laser Cutter Operator, Trouble-shooter & Funding - atrophy - the laser cutter for a local trade school allowed the pretty acrylic housing to be made.

Logistics, Project Management & more Funding - jmuirhead - driver, lifter of heavy stuff and trying to keep the others focused and when they are focused getting out of their way.

3 motors from cheap cordless drills
6 mm clear acrylic
3 mm black acylic
6 mm threaded rod and associated nuts & washers
8 mm threaded rod and associated nuts & washers
37 mm aluminium rod
lots of bearings (final numbers and types TBA)
various other fasteners (final numbers and types TBA)

80W CO2 laser cutter
lathe
hacksaw
adjustable wrench

Designs for cutting the acrylic will be available on Thingiverse.
Arduino code will be avilable on github.

Pictures of assembly will be posted soon.

• When designing using bearings (and well any machine components) find out the “common” sizes (meaning cheaper sizes) and design around these. This will help prevent heart attacks when you find out cost of the bearing that you selected because it was available, but unaware of it's price.
• Most CAD packages suck.
• 6mm acrylic ranges in thickness from 5.6 to 6.8mm.
• Measure, measure, measure & measure again before cutting, milling or machining anything.