Spartan Superway Half Scale Suspension 2017

This week, the test frame design was finalized and we are building it. In addition, we are finishing the welds on the suspension, making sure all parts fit well. At this point, the suspension is almost completely finished. Also, we ran some preliminary tests on the test frame which confirmed that our actuator works perfectly with the frame. Once the test frame is done, we will run more complete tests with the suspension. Our work is on schedule to be completed by Tuesday, May 8.

This week, we are working on the last few parts in preparation for putting everything together. Salvador has begun welding some pieces together. Joshua also got the test frame code done, which leaves Colin with the task of completing the actual test frame design for Maker Faire. As we enter the last couple weeks of school, everyone on the Spartan Superway team will need to use all their effort to show the Maker Faire that we are committed to creating a sustainable and reliable transportation network here in San Jose.

This week, we brought our parts to the machine shop on campus. Salvador continued his work on drilling holes. Joshua was responsible for finishing the parts by sanding and filing. Colin cut the pieces to size. We are on schedule to finish our project! Joshua and Colin working on parts Salvador pricking the bar before drilling Next week, we will begin finishing the parts and Joshua will finish the Arduino code.

This week was spent preparing the final slides for Presentation 2, and actually presenting of course. This was the first presentation day in which every team participated. In addition, we had guests from London attending our presentation. We wish every team good luck as we all enter the final phase of the Spartan Superway project. Next week, we will continue our work at the machine shop. Below is our presentation.

This week, we are preparing for Presentation 2. We are also beginning to drill the holes into the steel bars. Bearings also arrived so we are making sure they fit snugly in the bars. Salvador has been working on the parts in his garage shop, but his tools are somewhat limited. We are planning to go to the on-campus machine shop to finish the parts.  Salvador filing a bar in his garage shop Fitting the bearings

This week, Joshua worked on the Arduino code while Salvador acquired more materials for the suspension. Colin continues to work on the test frame and how to us the track linear actuator to achieve rotational motion of -17 to +17 degrees. Spring Break is next week but we all plan to put in a little bit of work.

This week, we explored ideas for the design of the test frame. We want the test frame to accommodate an angle of -17 to + 17 degrees, so we need a way to rotate a bar that the suspension would sit on. We determined that the optimal method is using a track actuator that was just lying around the Spartan Superway garage. The challenge will now be to convert linear motion to small angle rotation.

This week, we began acquiring the materials needed to build our suspension. Salvador picked up bar stock for much less than we expected to pay. We also took a battery from the Superway garage for powering the actuator with. Now that the process of acquiring the materials has begun, we will begin to build our suspension.  1" x 1" Steel bar Actuator battery Next week, we will acquire the other materials.

This week is Spring Break, so we will use this time to relax. Next week, we will prepare our slides for Presentation 2.

For this week, we updated the Spartan Superway team about our progress in the semester with our first presentation. A link to our presentation can be found below.

This week, we were updated on other sub-teams' progress in the semester through their presentations. We will prepare for our presentation, in which the second set of teams will present next week. We also discussed on adding bearings to the joints of the linkages to reduce the amount of friction in the system. Next week we will have the CAD updated and ready to showcase for our first presentation.

This week we had a general session for ME195B on how to make an effective presentation. Afterwards, we headed back to the shop and discussed how the test frame would be built in order to showcase our design in Maker Faire. We plan on using leftover parts and materials found in the Superway shop so that we wouldn't need to add more on to our Bill of Materials.

Instead of bringing the entire half-scale track to Maker Fair to demonstrate our design, we will be designing a frame that will showcase it instead. The design will begin within the next few weeks. We have also started Arduino program for the gyroscope and linear actuator.

We set up an appointment with Dr. Viswanathan to discuss the analysis of our linkage design. We also gave a lightning talk to the Spartan Superway sub-teams about our progress. A link to the presentation is shown below.

This week we looked over our final design to assure that all parts could be manufactured. After determining that our design didn't need any changes, we found some components in the Spartan Superway shop that could be used in our design, cutting the budget of our B.O.M. by a good amount.

Today we presented our final presentation for the semester. We will be finalizing our materials and starting our final report shortly. A link to our presentation is shown below.

We found some flaws in our recent CAD design and decided to make some changes. One would be a new linkage design utilizing two sets of linkages instead of one. This reduces the stress concentration in the links. We also shortened the vertical length of the design by making the dampening unit a link. FEA analysis will need to be done on the new linkage assembly, which will be done by our next presentation.

This week we looked into using linear actuators for our suspension to control the pitch leveling of the pod car. After careful research, we found out that an accelerometer, gyroscope, motor driver, and Arduino would be necessary to achieve proper results. Dr. Furman has provided a motor driver for us to use, and a linear actuator was readily available for us to use in Spartan Superway.

This week the team worked on developing our new concept to be incorporated into the half-scale suspension on SolidWorks. Our concept is to have the dampening system link not on the bottom like we originally had (Figure 1) but used as the center link to shorten the overall vertical length of the suspension (Figure 2).  Figure 1. Orginal Suspension Design with vertical dampening system at the bottom of the pivoting links Figure 2. This is our first iteration of our new concept design After creating this CAD Model we got to see what are the limitations of our concept design based on the dimensions of our components and the overall form of the parts. We realized after measuring within Solidworks that we need improvement on getting a greater range of pitch angle because we are currently getting 19 degrees in incline and 24 degrees in decline. Also, further development of a modular design needs to be implemented in our design so that we can manufacture with easy and hav...

We decided to use the dampening system as an actual link to shorten the vertical length of the suspension. A CAD model is currently being worked on and will hopefully be finished by next week. We also plan on continuing our FEA analysis with ANSYS within the next couple of weeks.