Mandiv Design Guide

Introduction

Welcome to the Mandiv Design Guide! Mandiv is the fourth iteration of a 120 pound drum spinner created by RoboJackets. The purpose of this guide is to explain all of the reasoning behind the design decisions during the creation of Mandiv. This guide will go in depth on why certain designs were chosen as well as explaining some of the calculations used to support those decisions.

Design Basics

Chassis

Overview

The chassis of Mandiv consists of eight parts: left and right inner side plates, left and right outer side plates, front plate, back plate, top plate, and bottom plate. These eight plates are the frame of the robot and are what hold the entire robot together.

Design Decisions

We designed the different pieces of the chassis to puzzle fit together. This was because puzzle fitting allows for stronger connections between plates as well as providing easier assembly due to each plate being able to fit in place without screws being needed to hold it there. Screws were then used to attach each plate to one another, ensuring the whole chassis remains in tact.

Each plate was pocketed in certain areas in order to reduce the overall weight of the chassis, to allow for some other parts to be inset in the chassis, and to provide some extra clearance between the chassis and other parts of the robot.

Notes/Helpful Advice

The water jet's tolerancing isn't perfect, so when designing puzzle fits, add a tolerance of around 0.007 inches to both sides in order to ensure that the pieces fit together easily. This will save a good amount of time because you won't need to file the pieces to make them fit together.