Undergraduate ME Capstone Project

Hello everybody!

I am a undergraduate senior, studying mechanical engineering, and I am very interested in building a VR aircraft motion simulator as my capstone project. But first, I'd like to ask some more experienced DIYers about what the scope of this project should realistically be. Here my two main constraints:

• Time: its needs to be completed in a 9 month time period by a team of myself and at least 3 others each working about 20hrs/week on the project
• Money: we will likely be paying everything out of pocket (and we're college students), so hopefully nothing more than $750

It's worth noting that we already have access to an HTC Vive, a 3D printer, and a full(ish) machine shop here at the university. Maybe this is not feasible given the constraints, but I would currently like to build a 6DOF simulator using an Arduino with Xplane, or similar software. If that's ridiculous let me know please! From your experience, and given my constraints, what type of project would you suggest me to build?

Thanks for the help.

Thanks for the reply, @noorbeast . I have been looking up some 2 & 3DOF aircraft sims, but there's a lot of information that's kinda hard to navigate. Do you off hand know of one or two great example projects that would be beneficial to look at first?

Also look at this ME senior design project.
https://fullmotiondynamics.com/

My point exactly.

-maybe go find some sponsors...

Would a 2Dof be complex enough to fit your Degree project requirements - will you be producing all software? Unfortunately there is no chance in build a working 6DOF that you could sit in for $750.

I'm not sure exactly how much I spent on my 2dof unit, but it was under $1000. I based mine off the joyrider design and the project cgodwin made. Here is a link to his thread. He did a great job breaking down his design and thought process.

https://www.xsimulator.net/communit...flight-race-sim-build.7498/page-5#post-109282

I already had the seat and controllers. I spent about 300 dollars on the PVC, 200 dollars on the two JRK units, 160 on both of the motors, and about 40 dollars on the two PSUs.



It's up and running right now, but I still have to go through and fine tune the settings.

Nice . Remember it is still a model until you put a passenger in it . Unfortunately they won't be starting with what you have and they would also need extra dollars for cable/connectors, feedback pots and steel arms, rods and unions to couple the motor movement to the Sim Rig. Adds up fast - even for a reasonable 2DOF. Just your HOTAS and a pedal set would nearly break their budget .

Success! My team, which now includes 6 people, has secured $6,700 of funding! We have about 7 months to complete a aircraft motion simulator, so @noorbeast would it now be feasible to attempt a 6DOF simulator?

We are now attempting to size the rotary actuators necessary for our 6dof build. How can we go about this process best, other than a guess-and-check method? Do anyone know of a Stewart Platform position that produces the "worst case" torque on our motors?

Does anyone have any ideas how to go about sizing the motors for a rotary actuator 6dof build? Particularly, we would like to know how to find the kinematic position that would require the highest demand of torque from the motors. @noorbeast ?

For a 6 dof, I believe the highest load on the actuators comes when the platform is low. The sideways thrust vector is at a maximum while the vertical thrust vector is at a minimum. You'd have to look at how things go when you add in yaw. It could be that one side of each actuator pair would require even more torque but the side in compression would be lifting the platform or that they both end up needing less torque with yaw. Might do a simulation of the angles and see how the numbers go.

Our team has been hard at work, and we have some exciting progress to share with this community! We've 3D printed and assembled a working prototype, and it may be seen by following this YouTube link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vdzpCGzRAZc

Also, we have designed on SolidWorks our actual, to-scale model. After much engineering analysis, nearly all dimensions have been defined. A picture of the isometric view of our SolidWorks model may be seen below:

Last, we have compiled a technical document that records our progress and summarizes our analysis up to date. It's kind of lengthy, but a quick skim would bring you up to speed on the current state and future outlook of our project. We are extremely excited to continue this process, and we will hopefully have a finished simulator in four short months. What do you all think?

More to come later...