lookforjack

Trying to minimize both down time and cost. But mainly down time. I could make a new backbone and replace it. That's how I have the one I pictured. It was from an old project and not in use at the time. Unfortunately, the one we are wanting to stiffen up is in use daily.

We have robot mounted tool for directing high energy laser pulses to parts for a process called laser shot peening. There are some pretty heavy gimbals mounted on both ends of the backbone 20lbs and 25lbs, that are causing a small defection of the tubes that we can detect on a camera inside the tool using an alignment laser beam. It's not a lot of deflection around 4-5mmm on a double pass. Meaning the light runs down the length of the tool and back. around 10 feet total distance to the camera. This movement messes with our tool's calibration. The defection is at its worst when the tool is held horizontally. Which makes sense as the tool is mounted close to center mass. I've attached a picture of a backbone like the one mounted on our tool. This one was removed and replaced with another one that had thicker tubes glued into those aluminum mounting brackets. Suggestions have been to insert a solid rod or pouring an epoxy inside and caping it off to prevent outgassing onto optics in the tool. We want it to be as stiff as possible. Regards.

Hello, I have a defection problem with a tool that was designed and built around 2009 which utilized some carbon fiber tubes that APC provided for us. I would like to find a possible solution that would allow us to sleeve these tubes internally to stiffen them up as much as possible with either a thick tube or solid rod. Removing the tubes is not an option as they are glued into some aluminum mounting brackets. I'm looking for something simple that will allow us to fix the problem without removing this backbone assembly. Regards, Jack