The W/B Mechanism
The construction of our real-life wiper blade product is coming closer than we ever expected! Our wooden modeled prototypes on the SCBA Scott AV-3000 face mask was a success into giving us insight of where we are right now and what steps need to be taken to build a better prototype. The wooden modeled prototypes consisted of a shaped gear(s) and shaft, with a specific size and shape to fit inside the mask itself. We did our best to cut the modeled components using something called a Rotary Tool. Our intentions on doing this was to get, primarily, a size view of everything in the mask, including the DC Motor, the gears and shafts. The shafts' volumetric sizes to fit inside the mask were 0.5 in. in length, 0.750 in. width, and 2 in. in height. The gears, given an unspecified amount of teeth, weren't cut out like gears, but just circles because of the poor material choice of Balsa Wood, which is really frail and won't give you accurate design. The DC motor was about an inch in circumferential size and didn't really take that much space in the mask. Again, nothing really moved in this model, we just wanted to place everything to get a size view to detail what specific shape and size will be needed for the firefighter to see and for the product to reach it's maximum efficiency.
Post- MGTR, our technical lead, Isaias Ramirez, Administrative Orion Jefferson, and one of our Educator Supervisor's, Ms. Wong, were discussing the next steps to be taken for the actual product to be built, in late February. We decided that if we needed accurate components to fit inside the mask, that'll have to be durable and strong, but yet lightweight and heat-resistant, we will need to 3D-print the all that we need. Our school's engineering and design instructor, Mr. Marcus has a 3D printer that he would be willing to make our components. All that we need to do is to get on CAD, fabricate the gears and shafts in there, show the dimensions and he would print it out. The type of CAD that we're using is Fusion 360 and that's what the W/B team has been using for the past 3 weeks now. After spring break, we expect to have all the components 3D printed and displaced seperately from eachother so that we inspect for accurate results. In the coming weeks, we want our design to be based on a four-bar linkage system, with a few added components in the mechanism for linear motion of the the wiper blade itself! The problem with that is that our due to our linkage mechanism, the W/B will only move to one side and not move to the other side unless we create a totally different mechanism, add more linkage components, or we reverse the polarity of the DC motor, which is something we'll need to look up on YouTube or have a electronics expert to teach us about. The mechanics and electronics aspects about this product is a little complex, seemingly with a limited amount of space in the face mask, but we will continue to reseach, continue to experiment, and with every trial-and-error we experience, we are one step closer to this product being built.
Included in this summary is a video we recorded of our W/B mechanism in early February to give you a visual of how the model works . . .
