Locking shaft in place

[Lil' Lavery]

Originally Posted by Kevin Ray

To the OP, you can very easily use a rachet and pawl (come-along type) to achieve your objective. Just mate it to the spool and manually release it at the end of the match.

I believe their intention is to be able to drive the device in both directions (they want to use the same motor to extend the device before retracting it). That doesn't completely rule out a ratchet/pawl, but it would mean they would need some sort of actuator to engage their pawl when necessary and disengage when not.

[brittnic98]

So we're thinking about the train brake idea , but does anyone know how that would work exactly using no pneumatics?

[Jon Stratis]

Originally Posted by brittnic98

So we're thinking about the train brake idea , but does anyone know how that would work exactly using no pneumatics?

Head out to your garage and look at your bicycle. The principle is identical - your squeezing something to create friction in order to stop it. The key difference between a train brake and a bicycle brake is that a train brake is closed by default, while a bike is open by default - that way the train will automatically brake if it loses power, rather than be unstoppable until it hits something.