McMaster Exoskeleton Team

Situation

I am part of the Joint Actuation and Transmission team, on the first iteration of the McMaster Exoskeleton team.
We must make a full exoskeleton from scratch, with no previous design to iterate from. The team was formed in November, and the full suit must be done by March, to allow for testing for the competition in May.
- Limited budget from the school and sponsors

I must design a knee gearbox that will increase torque output.
All components must be 3-D printed to keep costs down.
Assigned in January, the design must be completed by February, and fabricated in March.

This is the first exposure I had to such a complex design, and to make it even more complicated, I have to design a cycloidal drive, which is shown:

Components of a cycloidal drive

My design

Final, Fabricated Design

Machining Process

I designed and fabricated a full cycloidal drive, 3-D printing the whole housing.
The discs and eccentric shaft were machined on the CNC
The design was used for the final suit, using a gear ratio of 40:1, increasing the torque output of the knee.

The final cost of the gearbox was low, sitting under $50 excluding machined components.
Our team placed 4th out of 8 teams, a strong result for the first iteration with a very tight timeline.

Most importantly, I designed and fabricated something I had no familiarity with beforehand, and it ran properly! An engineers' dream🤩

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