8 wheel Drive Train

[Yannick B]

As a pre-season project, a friend and I took on the challenge to design a versatile drive train our team could use and modify for future years.

It was decided the drive train would have to meet certain requirements, including 8 wheels, a direct drive custom two speed gearbox, belts and versatile.

The outcome of these decisions produced a drive train that looked like this:



The specification of the drive train is as follows:
• 8 wheel drive
• Pneumatic wheels
• Two speed Custom shifting Gearbox
• Belt drive
• 0.064 in thick aluminium frame
• Mountings for other components
• Interchangeable wheels and shafts
• Width: 26.25 in, Length: 28.13
• Weight: 54 lbs
• Perimeter: 108.76 in
• Speeds: low gear: 7.3 ft/s, high gear: 16.7 ft/s

The frame was designed using Solidworks, and a Mastersketch was used as a base to allow us to modify the frame with ease.

The custom gearbox was designed so the two centre wheels would be directly driven, meaning if the belts or the chains on the frame broke, it would always have 4 wheel drive.



The gearbox was made from a VexPro ball shifter modified to fit our needs.

If you have any questions, please feel free to ask and I will try my best to answer all of them!

Yannick,
Co-Captain, Team 2994