August 5 & 6

I spent most of Wednesday just waiting for the sheet metal pieces so I thought I’d bundle these two days together 

Wednesday I finished designing and printing the inner guide rails to funnel the balls into the flywheel. Attached motors, wheels, and pillow bearings to the chassis. Then today I attached the flywheel subsystem to the intake frame which I later mounted onto the chassis through the pivot motor.

Before the sheet metal arrived yesterday I spent time finishing the design of the inner guide rails and the arm that would attach to the servo that blocked the balls from escaping through the turned off flywheels as it drives. I got my idea from a pinball arm with a wider rounded back end and a smaller rounder front end so that the tennis balls may not get stuck when they open. This is the only electronic I am left to test.

Once the sheet metal arrived I started to attach all wheel motors and wheels to the new chassis. I had to deburr the holes for the motors a bit since they were too small but I got it done before the end of the day.

Almost all of today was spending building and assembling. I started by attaching the pivot motor to the chassis and the pillow bearing on the opposite wall. I then mounted the flywheels onto the intake frame and tested them out. They spun pretty fast around 2000 rpm but did have to be angled quite high to launch far. Then I spent a lot of time mounting the intake onto the pivot motor and chassis. I struggled a bit with getting the screws on since there were so small gaps to fit them in. Lastly I mounted the inner guide rails. 

I then tested the pivot motor at 16rpm and it worked great, being able to turn the whole intake easily and with it locking position when it is not moving. The intake motor though is 80rpm and it is too slow for the intake as it seems to just push away the balls so I bought a 160rpm motor to try and fix that. 

First thing tomorrow is doing the wiring and putting some rubber on the intake rollers.