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Re: Alternatives to Welding?
By tubing, I am guessing you mean square extrusion? Much of the following applies to round tubing as well.
Gusset plates can be made with a hacksaw and drill. If the tube is in danger of crushing (from nut & bolt) use hard wood (we use oak & maple), pounded into the tube, as an internal support.
Don't be so hard on blind rivets. They are faster to remove than a nut & bolt (want to race me?) and at least as strong. Never ever had one fail.
In some places we leave two of the 4 tube walls intact as 'tongues' we use for fastening. We've also used 3/4" square as an internal splice for 1" square (1/8" walls), as well as 1-1/4" square as an external splice.
We use 80/20 for prototyping, since it's easily adjustable, but move to extrusion for the final robot where it makes sense.
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