Please help me out guys... got a mechanical project

From which game did you get the idea? and which game consumed all your time?

My personal feeling is that you deserve another year of study.

By supplying you with help CR4 may actually assist you in getting a undeserved job in the motor industry and thereby putting the lives of people at stake.

Are you prepared to work hard at it?

"The block will slide with the inclination of the vehicle" - Did you consider the friction between the block and the bracket?

The previous submission is about the clearest thought I've heard from the original posting. Da-undead does indeed need at the very least, one more year of 'technical study', not to mention the proper design aspects of this mechanism and greater functionality of this proposal. There are a great many details you left out, and without details, you are in essence, building blind.

No offense, but you need to hit the books, and put away the PS2.

Waterman

OOH OOH! A Bandwagon. I love bandwagons! I'm gonna jump on!

Ignore the others they are just mean and grumpy, I'm cute and furry... ()

At lest you have an idea!...so many just post saying ..do my homework/project or I'll cry.

You have the idea...just do it, a wee tip tho'

Do it electrically, a couple of screw jacks? An on/off switch and a simple pendulum arrangement to define vertical and make contact if it's too far off (ok it'll need damping.

Or a DC motor/gearbox raiing/lowering an arm...may be easier to simplify and go for a side stand or whatever you call it ...just an arm out one side....

Build first design after!

Right first time is a myth....wrong as quick as possible is the way forward!!!...you will learn from the real constraints of the real world...

Good luck and have a pint for me.

Del

(Ok guys don't shoot I know there are a few controversial comments there...but at least the guy has some sort of plan!)

pottanmaarey.......

ithu ippozhalla thonnande.... kura mumbu ithu kittiyirunnengil vallathum nadannene...!!!!!

jithunte veetil poyittu kittiya samayam muzhuvan kalichu kalanju le???? aa neram valla slide-um undaakkamayirunnille???

cmmon... replies awaited, Mr. da_undead...... ithum oru chali kulam aakkam......

Don't think 'replies awaited' fits, more like medication awaited!!

Not Latin, Croatian, Greek nor French or German, closest I found was Welsh and only two words of that translated out into English.

perhaps it's Icelandic. That's a language I don't speak, aside from every other.

Try Gibberish!

I speak gibberish!

You too?

"ithu ippozhalla thonnande.... kura mumbu ithu kittiyirunnengil vallathum nadannene...!!!!!"

And furthermore,

"jithunte veetil poyittu kittiya samayam muzhuvan kalichu kalanju le???? aa neram valla slide-um undaakkamayirunnille???"

Shirley, you don't use language like that on Sunday too!

That's not gibberish, it's Moronish, spoken by the Moronic in the moors of Moronica.

And stop calling johnjohn Shirley!

In the moors or on the moors? Also known for the fine tones of the lesser known harmoronica, I am guessing.

As they frolic about the moors?

As they pass through the moors?

I think I'll have one moor for the road and head home.

Yes indeed. I have had moor than enough. So please, no moor.

hi guys dont be mad abt that language.......

its MALAYALAM- a regional language in INDIA.....

so dont waste time on that topic

help me out guys, by comment to my doubts..............

hope u will.......

If this is a mechanical and not electro-mechanical course, What you have described sounds alot lik a a closed loob rack and pinion system. Go ahead and build what you described. To make it work will be a matter of proper placement of the sensors.

Yeh, Rack and pinion would be good......is it fail-safe like a screw jack?

Don't go for straight pneumatic cylinders as in a failure the piston can go back into the cylider and the bike will fall over...that's why I suggested a screw jack...fail-safe, (hopefully the rack would be too?) Thinking of these points is part of the fun...

Have you started yet?....put that beer down and get on with it! ...yes you!....stop sufing and get stuck in.

Out of interest can't a mech eng use a switch and a motor? As an Electronic designer I did a final year project with with wheels, steering rack etc...?

Hi D.T.C.,

Yes, I suppose he could use a switch and a motor, and I suppose a screw type failsafe arrangement would be a plus. However, lets think outside the box (or bike in this case).

Lets have a portable gyroscope that can quickly be strapped to any bike. Gyro connects to bike's battery to get up to speed. Now then, no need for a stand at all. The bike won't lean or fall over!

This gives an added bonus. Theft protection! If a thief jumps on the bike and roars off while gyro is energized, guess what happens the first time he takes a curve at 60+ mph?

Thanx D.T.C for replying and not being grumpy and stuck up like others.

Appreciate your help and suggestions. Will try to do it with a screw jack, coz it makes more sense that way ...

What kind of bike? Harley or Schwinn?

Thanx everyone for replyin to the thread...

To those who were grumpy and stuck up ... you may all rot in hell

To those who helped me out with their valuable ideas, thanx a bunch .

Be sure to check the forum coz i will try to upload the design and show it soon.

Believe me, I didnt steal the idea from any game.. and it aint that complicated, once you get down to it.

By the way ya all are still welcome to type in your valuable suggestions and opinions ..

Luv ya all

Was I Grumpy or Stuck Up. He was the eightt dwarf right, Snobby.

At 6'3 220# I think I too big for a dwarf.

Of course I am grumpy. My arm is broken because a LAZY guy did not fix the handrails in a public place.

about your project:

You could look at a Joystick, used upside down with an extended shaft and weight for a level sensor. It will supply a x and y analogue signal.

The analogue signal might get to the correct position faster.

Instead of a block, how about a mercury switch, like in a thermostat. As the mercury slides from one side to the other it activates either the left or right solenoid. When both solenoids are receiving a signal the bike is considered level and the system stopped.

Not very environmentally friendly in case the level switch ever gets broken. You could do it cheap with a couple of limit switches from Radio Shack and a bar type pendulum. Better yet, design in the mercury switch and then right before production make a change to the cheap version and charge more because of all the engineering time to save the environment even though the overall cost is half. (I've worked in large corporations far too long. )

Since I am sitting on the bike before I get off why not level it then. Set the out riggers or booms as you call them to hold the bike level before you get off.

Unless you live in LA and don't want your bike to fall over during an earthquake. Good luck with that.

Working off Del's suggestion I would use 2 small linear actuators 2 microswitches a pendulum setup and a small battery to power it all.

Simple logic applied will net you the solution using these components.

Can't do all the work for you!

Left out the on off switch sorry.

You could practice "tap-dancing" and come up with a good song and dance to explain you predicament to the prof. If that works, you could be set for a career in management!

Anyway, if the two booms are hydraulically extended, and you are only stabilizing the bike and not actually lifting it, why get overly complicated. Hold the bike steady when stopped, and extend the booms with the a single low pressure pump at the minimum pressure needed to move them. Once the booms hit ground they stop. If they need unequal lengths, they will extend unequally until pressure in both booms equalizes. When both booms stop moving, a single solenoid will close, and the pump is stopped. Hydraulic fluid locks the booms in place until the valve is opened.

Fun project.

I did a similar thing with a fully-enclosed motor scooter I built. I needed outriggers to stabilize it while stopped (because my legs were inside). I used a pedal-operated system, with independent right/left control.

See also: Ecomobile

If the system is to maintain the bike in the vertical condition (as opposed to place it in a vertical condition from a few degrees off), then a gravity operated system would be appealing: upon command, the legs drop down, and are latched into place, with devices like those on locking pneumatic cylinders. Retraction could be manual (light and cheap) or pneumatic (or, of course, hydraulic, electric linear motor, etc).

There are all sorts of possibilities. Making a system like this actually work, in the real world, is non-trivial. If you go with hydraulics, and want fast actuation, then a small accumulator would be useful, so that the pump does not have to be started to make things move -- just shift the valve. (You can alternatively keep a pump running all the time, and vent fluid back to tank.)

Hydraulics have an advantage (over pneumatics) in being able to extend at low force, lock, and then resist a high force -- without the need for the sorts of locks seen on pneumatic cylinders. (A simple closed center valve naturally does this.)

A pendulum, with a small air damper, would detect the straight up condition, provided the bike is at a standstill. If the bike it moving slightly, and turning, then then pendulum would not be accurate. (As you can imagine, with the bike cranked over into a high speed turn, the pendulum will align with the bank angle, not gravity.)

In any case. play around, and have fun. Given several months and a $10,000 budget, you should be able to come up with a crude prototype. The Ecomobile system, BTW, is computer-actuated, and still doesn't work well enough to avoid wobbles on starting up.

Amazing. At first blush, you are describing training wheels. Maybe sprung wheels.

My thought would be to have your training wheels mounted on an upside down U shaped bar that would slide through an traverse opening in the frame just under the seat. No matter how the bike is leaned, the wheels will stay on the ground. A mechanical brake will engage with the U shaped bar when you take your weight off the seat. A simple toggle under the seat can dis-engage the brake if desired. Keep it out of the way of your pedals. Upwardly adaptable to motorcycles.

I hereby put this idea in the public domain because I don't believe I could make any money from it.

A non warm and non fuzzy Bill

I think a simple system would be to have two ratcheting rods that extended when a lock was released. They would drop to the ground however far down they needed, engage the latch, bike stands. Time to leave, release latch, retract rods with a small cable attached to a lever. No batteries,switches,etc.

That's tooooo good...

No hydaulics or electrics? That won't leak or blow up! No fun at all...

Hey Del, how about this.

Modify the center stand of the motorcycle. Place a "lazy Susan" (swivel) bearing between the stand and the bike. Now when you stop your bike on a hill, you let the rear end of the bike seek the lowest point (down hill side). Now, the bike is level side-to-side, Course you would need some sort of parking brake to insure the bike's there when you come back and not at the bottom of the hill.

-J²

For a coin, drunk cowboys can sit on it!

Now thats thinking out of the box!

I like it!

An ordinary bike stand, with friction pivot where it joins to the bike. Get off the bike, put down the stand, then holding the bike stand firmly on the ground, tilt the bike until it is straight up and down. If the friction is strong enough the bike will stay upright. Don't make it too stiff though, or it won't work well.

Or you can go with this one....It hangs off a pedal. Just set your pedal to the correct height, and set the brake. http://patentpending.blogs.com/patent_pending_blog/2005/09/bike_and_kick_s.html

This was patented in 1891.

Yusef1: great reply, GREAT old patent!

If he gets this thing built & mounted up, it will outweigh the bike...

There have been some very, very interesting comments pertaining to this students project. There have also been quite a few lacking, what's the word...oh, that's it, sense.

The originator of this project said that he has 2 weeks in which to submit his proposal. Good luck.

Creativity, and logic go hand in hand

He probably has a week left yet so he should have just about decided which way he is going to tackle it. All weekend to get the bits and pieces together, a day to make it and a day to draw it up and a day to write it up. Heaps of time yet before it has to be handed in.

Time management is a good skill -- this student say's he left this 'til the last minute and now is behind the 8 BALL. Hey guest -- NO SYMPATHY HERE

Or he's perfecting his JIT skills!

or JTL

.

..

...

Just Too Late

Yes -- and he will learn that JIT works well -- but it is limited in it's effectiveness in some applications, and occasionally quite costly in it's limitations.

is paramount to the success of WTF?

Maybe a course in PTB will help! Middle management seem to have the ability to put up the umbrella in times of crisis!

He could learn how to make concrete and lay a level foundation!!

He can still catch the game due some laundry!

HA HAHAHAHAHAHHA! laundry! HAHAHAHAH!

There are so many ways to skin this cat, that I don't even know where to start. The biggest thing you have working against you is time to completion. Maybe a quick fix would be to use a mercury switch in line with your solenoid valve to turn it on and off until it hits a center or level position. You need to use a 4 way, 3 position, spring return, tandem centered directional control valve. A size D03 would be more than sufficient for what you are trying to do. A cheap way out would be to contact a distributor for Hydraforce or Sun cartridge valves and do it that way. Any time the mercury switch is off of level, it will actuate the valve and return to a level position.

The next time you do a project, think it through before you act, and then don't panic when you can't see a solution. Unfortunately, that is not taught in school anymore. Remember the old addage, we can't hide our mistakes, but the doctors can bury theirs. We do not have the luxury of practice as a way of describing what we do.

Whoaa ...

A lot of replies ...

Thanx a bunch, all you guys for your creative input ..

I really wanna thank all of you by replying individually to all yours posts ..

But thats too time consuming, and I really dont have any 2 spare..

Thanx everyone 4 replying. I have just about solved the problem, from all the input you gave, and some ingenuity

Will post soon, what I finally did. Right now am preparing Power point slides 4 da presentation. Wish me luck

And here I was going to suggest a tripod. That extends to 2 meters tall. With a chain that hangs from the top. With a hook.

Extend the tripod, set the bike underneath, and hang it from the hook.

Works on uneven or sloping ground.

Folds up, and stores on the centre bar.

Can be purchased off the shelf....a surveyor's tripod would be perfect.

Damn! What a great idea!