Week 6

For week 5 not much was done. Refinements on motor sizing calculations and communication among the other sub-teams were conducted and as a result we began to notice issues. One of the main issues was in realizing the amount of current needed to power the motors to provide the torque calculated was too large.

This week (week 6), the entire half scale bogie team had a team meeting after the final presentations in order to clarify a number of issues. One of the issues was regarding the prototype and what was expected of the team as a whole. We wanted to avoid spending too much time on production and manufacturing of prototype along with the other sub teams and we decided that the prototype due at the end of the semester will serve more as testing the integration of other teams. Additionally, we decided as a whole team that the budget requests for the parts needed will be due mid November in order to have parts to work with for early Spring. 

Furthermore, after further reviewing the bogie CAD, we realized that the space for the motors and brakes we had in mind were very limited, and we decided to put on hold our fail-safe braking system we created previously. The motor will remain offset from the bogie as previously discussed. The motor CAD was added to the bogie assembly via GrabCAD (See image). An idea we are currently discussing is the use of a worm gear for our gearbox, as it can provide good gear reduction and "fail-safe" as the wheels can lock if the motor isn't moving. Discussion among the braking/propulsion team, steering, wayside, and solar will be conducted as we all need information from one another to move along. (Power/current requirements, space along the bogie are major topics we plan on covering Wednesday)

Placement of motor on left bogie is circled in red.