Black Widow
Individual - MIT Undergraduate Student - February to May 2018
I built a robot in the MIT Mechanical Engineering class, Design and Manufacturing I. The goal of this class is to construct a robot only using simple shop tools, provided electronics, and a lathe and mill. At the end of the course, the robot then competed on a game board.
One of six in the class who won the 2018 Whitelaw Prize for “originality in design” by the MIT Mechanical Engineering department.
One of six in the class who won the 2018 Whitelaw Prize for “originality in design” by the MIT Mechanical Engineering department.
My goal was to lift an object to the top of a tube.
Rather than following conventional designs, I pursued the novel solution of a two robot system.
Outer Robot: A carrier that transported the second robot to the tube.
Inner Robot: A climber that ascended the tube to lift the target object.
Rather than following conventional designs, I pursued the novel solution of a two robot system.
Outer Robot: A carrier that transported the second robot to the tube.
Inner Robot: A climber that ascended the tube to lift the target object.
Initially, I generated seven different design concepts and compared them in a decision matrix, evaluating their strengths and weaknesses across four key criteria.
Arriving at my final design, I chose the concept of a robot that would drive up the inside of the tube. To make the design viable, I performed calculations to determine the spring force needed to push the wheels outward. The force had to be strong enough to generate sufficient friction for climbing, but not so high that it caused excessive drag or risked damaging the mechanism.
With two robots, the only limitation to how high my robot could push the object was from the length of the wire connecting them.
I modeled both robots in SolidWorks, iterating on designs to balance weight, stability, and climbing mechanics. I prototyped multiple versions by machining parts manually using mills and lathes, fabricating structural components, and integrating provided electronics for actuation and control.