Process

This machine runs on a combination of mechanical movement 92 and movement 101. The idea behind it was to create a realistic motion of wings flapping. To make this machine I first had to cCAD out all the parts that I wanted to use and see how they would fit together. Below are the two assemblies that I made from all the parts I would later be laser cutting.

CAd low fidelity protoype:

This is version one of the machine that was run by a rod instead of a gear box. In it, I made a number of mates to stimulate how the different pieces would move and then recorded the movement. I used this video to see if my assembly could produce the movements that I wanted and it could. From the video I saw that to get a realisitic motion I only had to stagger the movements of the shatfs that were attached to the crank wheels so long as the wheels had the same angular velocity.

 

This is the second version of the machine with the cracnk wheels run by a gear box. I could not create mates that would allow me to see if the mahcine created the right motions but the movements where essentially the same as the first version.

2d drawings:

I exported the parts I cadded in Solidworks as DXF files and placed them all onto an adobe illustrator file and from then on I machined each piece using the respective process. This included water jet cutting the base and plaama cutting the crank shafts. Later I also laser cut two support fins for the back of the machine.

Medium Fidelity Prototype:

The first physical protoype I made focused exclusively on the movements of the wings and confirmed the fact that I could phyically emulate the movement of wings realistically.

First Attempt:

Below are images of my first attempt at building this machine. I laser cut the wing rods, the gears, the cranks wheels, the wings and the warrior. I plasma cut the crack shafts, angle grinded them and then sand blasted them. I made the rods attached to the cranks from dowels and used a combination of nuts and spacers to space out the wings so they would would intefere with each other. I also had to trim the inner wings so that they did not interfere with the outer ones.

Final & Post Processing:

After building my first attempt and adding black wood stain to the dowels I realised that the machine did not work and I had a very hard time trouble shooting it. After a while I realised that this was because of the friction between the dowel rods and the guides so I removed the upper set of guides and added weights to the bottom of the dowels to pull them through any friction they encountered. This worked well to alleviate friction but the machine tiself still was not working fully. I thus disassembled the machine and tried to run the gear box by itself and found out that it was the problem all along. The gears were all getting stuck and could not rotate. Sadly, I could not figure out why in time to submit the midterm.

For post processing I am actually very proud of the paint job I did to create the fuzzy blue color of the acrylic back and supports. I did this by using three coats of acrylic frosting paint and then spray painting it lightly from a distance of about 1ft. Then I laser cut a stencil of the warrior and used the negative to spray paint the warriors shadow. I then used the positive to cover up the warrior and create a white out of  the shadow which ended up looking really cool.

Failures/Lessons Learned

In the end I am still proud of it even though it does not work fully, the gears do run a little which do create small movements so the machine does work to some degree. However, if I was to do this again I would have worked on the gear box first and gotten it to run smoothly before adding any other components to it. If time permits I may even try to do this again and get it to work.

Total Estimate: $488.71

Materials: $101.71

(Note: areas obtained from solid works Assembly)

• Wooden Dowels
  • ~37.5″ used of ~3/8″ diameter dowels
    • 3/8D by 48in dowel on Home depot for $0.98
  • ~15″ used of 1/8″ diameter dowels
    • 1/8D by 36″ at Home depot for $0.34
• Acrylic Sheet
  • ~370 in^2 of 1/4″ thick acrylic used
  • found 12″x12″ sheets for $5.41 each on freckleface.com
  • buy three with area of 432in^2 for $16.23
• Steel Sheet (1/16″ thick)
  • ~ 7.4 in^2 of steel
  • found 48in^2 piece for $13.24 on Metals Depot
• Plywood sheet 1/4″ thick
  • ~90 in^2 of wood
  • found 4ftx8ft piece for $17.62 at Home Depot
• Spray Paint
  • white paint
    • found 1 can of Rust-Oleum paint at Target for $2.99
  • satin navy
    • Found 6 pack at home depot for $25.62
    • $4.27 per can
• Black wood Gel Stain
  • found 2 pack at Home depot for $33.96
  • $16.98 per can
• Nuts
  • ~30 #8 nuts
  • Found 100 pack zinc for $6.24 at Home Depot
• Spacers
  • ~10 washers
  • Found 100 pack zinc at Home Depot for $4.68
• #8 Machine Screws
  • 4 #8 1.5″ long screws
  • Foudn 100 pack zinc for $6.86 at Home Depot
• Weld on acrylic Solvent #16
  • Found one tube on Amazon for $14.48 and free shipping
• Super Glue
  • ~2 tubs
  • found 12 pack for $7.06 on Amazon with free shipping
  • $1.18 for 2 tubes
• 1 hot glue stick
  • Found 40 pack on Amazon with free shipping for $11.95
  • $0.30 for one stick

Labor: $387

• Time : 20 hr
• Average machinist pay per hour: $19.35