pic: Mecanum Musings

Originally Posted by lbarger

Great design. Do the nuts and bolt ends miss the carpet? You may want to look into tapping one end of the c-section and countersinking the clearance on the other. Then you could use a flat head screw and match the length of the screw to the c-section width. Then you should be able to avoid any hardware overhang and further reduce the weight. Typically you should have at least three full threads for any bolted joint.

Keep up the great work and please post your final version!

No, there's plenty of clearance for the hardware holding the rollers to the C channel. I'd really prefer to not take any more material out of the C, as the goal here was to go cheap and easy (hence going with aluminum from McMaster. If I go to something stronger (like a higher strength alloy), Then possibly I'd work on lowering the profile a bit.

I'd love to post the final version, but for me all designs are a work-in-progress. Maybe I'll post some renders side by side with a real thing if these actually get built? It's all really up to the team for what they'd like to build. I am just a mentor, anyway.

[rutzman]

Originally Posted by Speedfiend

I am just a mentor, anyway.

Just a mentor? You say that like it's unimportant...

Originally Posted by rutzman

Just a mentor? You say that like it's unimportant...

I understand the importance of the position, but I see the limits in the spot. I'm here to teach students about engineering and smart decision making, not win them a competition. If that were my job, you'd be seeing a lot more designs up here that I "planned" on making, and justification on why they're the best.

Instead, I spend my time designing and planning parts and mechanisms with the intent of showing students that there are more possibilities than the most complex (high school students seem to be good at finding the most difficult solution first...) and expensive option.

A mentor should teach the team, not BE the team in my opinion.