[Ivan] has been keeping his 3D printers busy with parts he’s experimenting with to build a tracked motion setup for a tank-like vehicle. His design uses several interlocking parts, so if you want to duplicate it, we hope your printer calibration is up to snuff. He’s still printing more parts and promises to release the files once the design proves out.
However, you can see he’s off to a good start. Small pieces fit together and accept a piece of filament as a sort of hinge. Some pins keep the filament from working out. Pads fit into the main parts and hold down with zip ties. The whole flexible tread locks into sprockets and a groove on a drive wheel.
The initial test prints are in PLA, but he intends to print the final in durable nylon. By the first video, it is clear all the parts fit (with a little knife work on the first parts) and they move as you’d expect. You’ll see in the second video that it does work, it just takes a lot of parts. A whole lot of parts.
We wondered if [Ivan] had seen OpenWheel, which includes a tread you can print with flexible filament. Of course, there’s more than one way to create treads, too.
seems like it would be easy to make those tread pieces designed to snap into place instead of needing the zip ties.
Pivot-hinge points will wear, make ’em robust. Dirt is like sandpaper.
I’ve noticed a lot of smaller tracked vehicles are using one piece molded rubber tracks, avoiding the hinge problem. 3D printing a mold for your own treads might be a good option too.
they actually do snap in, I think the zip ties are just for durability
The tracks are not the best colour for camouflage,
but the rest of the tank is as I can’t see it.
Awesome .. and I wish I had his attitude. Watching him, I feel sullen by comparison.
It needs some suspention also the drive links will brake easaly. This guy always makes cool projects but bad enginering designes , fore sure if this guy made it it will brake in first run.
3mm filament would work better for hinge pins.
wow… that are a lot of parts! Nice tracks, can’t wait to see these tracks riding. Nice job.
this guy is making… serious tracks…