Quote:
Originally Posted by RollinTDollin
Nice!
Some questions:
-what material are you using for the top of your platforms?
-what is the angle of those ramps?
-how much does each "wing" weigh?
Looking good!
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The design is shown with 16 mm Polygal sheet (
www.polygal.com), a type of corrugated polycarbonate. It's .55 lbs. per square foot, so about 13 lbs. for both sides, and exceptionally rigid. We're considering trading down to something like regular, 1/16" polycarbonate. It's about 50% lighter, but considerably more flexible. It's hard to argue with the rigidity of the Polygal stuff, though.
The ramps are angled at approximately 30* -- and there will also be similar ramps on at least one more side per lift. That may seem to be steep compared to a lot of ramp robots, but the overall height of the ramp is only about 2", so we anticipate most robots ought to be able to clear it with little trouble.
Each 'wing' is weighs entirely too much. If I conservatively overestimate, as the models are missing hardware, I'd say they're about 30 lbs. each right now. They're heavier than we anticipated because the first iteration of the design buckled the rectangular aluminum tubing when we tested it to a safety factor of two. I'll be able to iteratively remove material from the lifts after they're assembled and we're able to better test how well they handle stress.