Octoman - Great news that the Snappy stuff is durable!
Sorry everyone that I haven't posted in so long. The semester has been crazy hectic. But it has made the time fly by. I've tried my best to keep up on the threads I follow, but haven't posted much here because I haven't done much other than school related stuff. I do in fact only have 2 classes for next semester, both of which are easy electives and conveniently scheduled for only Tuesday and Thursday. So 3 days off of classes during the week
However, I have been in the talks with a local company about a full time job upon graduation and part time for spring semester. I'm currently dealing with the great experience of HR.
So this semester we started our capstone project. I was lucky enough to get put on a team of 3 that consisted of both of my roommates and one other guy. We are doing our capstone project for a local dairy farm that my roommate works for on the weekends. We are making some changes to their homemade dairy cow corral gate. It's similar to this, but was handmade by the owner.
http://www.delaval-us.com/-/Product...es/Crowd-gates/DeLaval-Drover-HRS-crowd-gate/
The system is driven on c-channel tracks with roller chain. The chain is welded to each end and strung through the c-channel, through some tensioners, and around the driveshaft. This happens on each side and propels the system back and forth. It has an up and down motion as well. The cows are loaded into the corral and the gate is dropped. It is then advanced towards the parlor to force 16 cows at a time into the parlor. So that's the jist of the operation. The drive system falls off of the sprockets regularly, the gate can run into a cow and pivot out of the track, the bearings in the drive wheels are shot, and there are no mechanical limits. Basically we are adding limit switches run by a PLC to limit all of the movements. We are also going to add new wheels and drive sprockets to have a contained drive system.
Here is a crude prototype I made. The professors here want a justification for EVERY decision. So this was to show that if the gate were to get skewed from side to side that the chain will no longer be able to jump off of the sprocket.
We have our second Project Review Board on Thursday night and then we can start ordering parts after Thanksgiving break.
On another note, my fiance and I had our engagement pictures taken at her great aunt and uncles house. No pics of us, but this is one of my favorites.
And in my latest endeavor, I learned how to use the 3D printer in the engineering building and I am taking full advantage of it. It's a Makerbot Replicator. I've been using it for about a week and have already found useful garage items to make, mostly found from Thingiverse.com
The very front are protective caps for wood chisels. Middle from left, finger guard for Dremel, "plunge router" for Dremel, wall mounted mini Mag-lite holder, craftsman radial arm saw safety switch, and a wall mounted caliper holder. Back row from left, wall mounted aerosol can holder (4 made), FILE HANDLES (3 made with lots more to go), wall mounted pen holder, and a key holder. I am absolutely pumped about the file handles. They have cut outs in the center for all 3 types of tangs so I hope to have a handle for every file I acquired from the auction a ways back.
Hopefully I can do a better job of keeping you guys updated next semester and maybe I can take on a few projects with my free time.