Drone Gripper

sketchfab

This is our gripper design for the Aerial Rotocraft Competition last year at Gonzaga University in Spring 2015. Jun Li, Erik Buren, and I took charge of prototyping, designing, and assembling the mechanical parts of the claw, while Max Hernandez, Luis Perez, and Sean Allen handled the electronics and programming responsibilities. We designed all the red and blue components from scratch and brought them to life through 3D printing, with outstanding results! The geared arms of our design interacted seamlessly with the internal Lego worm drive, which connected to a Lego axle and gear on top where the motor was mounted. To ensure optimal grip performance, we opted for Lego wheels and tires as the contact points for the gripper. This decision was inspired by the impressive results we achieved with our original Lego prototype versions, which convinced us to incorporate this feature into the final model. The upper and lower parts of each arm featured rubber bands wrapped around both sides above the swivel point, allowing the claw to be flexible and adapt to objects of various shapes and sizes.