element14 Community
element14 Community
    Register Log In
  • Site
  • Search
  • Log In Register
  • About Us
  • Community Hub
    Community Hub
    • What's New on element14
    • Feedback and Support
    • Benefits of Membership
    • Personal Blogs
    • Members Area
    • Achievement Levels
  • Learn
    Learn
    • Ask an Expert
    • eBooks
    • element14 presents
    • Learning Center
    • Tech Spotlight
    • STEM Academy
    • Webinars, Training and Events
    • Learning Groups
  • Technologies
    Technologies
    • 3D Printing
    • FPGA
    • Industrial Automation
    • Internet of Things
    • Power & Energy
    • Sensors
    • Technology Groups
  • Challenges & Projects
    Challenges & Projects
    • Design Challenges
    • element14 presents Projects
    • Project14
    • Arduino Projects
    • Raspberry Pi Projects
    • Project Groups
  • Products
    Products
    • Arduino
    • Avnet Boards Community
    • Dev Tools
    • Manufacturers
    • Multicomp Pro
    • Product Groups
    • Raspberry Pi
    • RoadTests & Reviews
  • Store
    Store
    • Visit Your Store
    • Choose another store...
      • Europe
      •  Austria (German)
      •  Belgium (Dutch, French)
      •  Bulgaria (Bulgarian)
      •  Czech Republic (Czech)
      •  Denmark (Danish)
      •  Estonia (Estonian)
      •  Finland (Finnish)
      •  France (French)
      •  Germany (German)
      •  Hungary (Hungarian)
      •  Ireland
      •  Israel
      •  Italy (Italian)
      •  Latvia (Latvian)
      •  
      •  Lithuania (Lithuanian)
      •  Netherlands (Dutch)
      •  Norway (Norwegian)
      •  Poland (Polish)
      •  Portugal (Portuguese)
      •  Romania (Romanian)
      •  Russia (Russian)
      •  Slovakia (Slovak)
      •  Slovenia (Slovenian)
      •  Spain (Spanish)
      •  Sweden (Swedish)
      •  Switzerland(German, French)
      •  Turkey (Turkish)
      •  United Kingdom
      • Asia Pacific
      •  Australia
      •  China
      •  Hong Kong
      •  India
      •  Korea (Korean)
      •  Malaysia
      •  New Zealand
      •  Philippines
      •  Singapore
      •  Taiwan
      •  Thailand (Thai)
      • Americas
      •  Brazil (Portuguese)
      •  Canada
      •  Mexico (Spanish)
      •  United States
      Can't find the country/region you're looking for? Visit our export site or find a local distributor.
  • Translate
  • Profile
  • Settings
Summer of Green Tech Design Challenge
  • Challenges & Projects
  • Design Challenges
  • Summer of Green Tech Design Challenge
  • More
  • Cancel
Summer of Green Tech Design Challenge
Blog Blog #3: Sunray Bender: Building the physical device
  • Blog
  • Forum
  • Documents
  • Leaderboard
  • Polls
  • Files
  • Members
  • Mentions
  • Sub-Groups
  • Tags
  • More
  • Cancel
  • New
Join Summer of Green Tech Design Challenge to participate - click to join for free!
  • Share
  • More
  • Cancel
Group Actions
  • Group RSS
  • More
  • Cancel
Engagement
  • Author Author: hitesh.boghani
  • Date Created: 19 Oct 2023 1:12 AM Date Created
  • Views 574 views
  • Likes 6 likes
  • Comments 2 comments
  • seeeduino xiao
  • design challenge
  • summer of green tech design challenge
  • sunray bender
  • solar
Related
Recommended

Blog #3: Sunray Bender: Building the physical device

hitesh.boghani
hitesh.boghani
19 Oct 2023

To make mirror move in azimuth and elevation, I needed to mount it on a gimbal with those degrees of freedom. I figured that the wood would be easier to work with than metal. Also, I don't have a 3D printer which means I can't build it using plastic and so it will need to be built out of some scrap wood that I have in my shed.

So, let's get started! Slight smile

Here is a picture of bits I started with.

image

I also have some gears and rollers from the broken office printer and so I used those. The mirror is also shown in the photo.

I cut the wood into strips to make a 'C' shaped bracket and used metal brackets to hold them together. Then I mounted a geared DC motor on its side and used another wooden piece to pass the roller through. I had drilled the hole to give a snug fit so that the roller and wood can move together when the motor moves them. However, when I mounted the mirror, the wooden piece slipped on the roller due to moment applied by the mirror. So, I had to drill some holes through the metal rod (roller) to secure it to the wooden piece to keep them together. This worked and it then stayed where put.

The geared motor has slotted part which I have used to mate with the end of the roller. The slot is wider than the pin on the roller so it creates a huge amount of backlash. This will need to be fixed but when the control will work in closed loop, it might be OK to leave it as it is.

Here is the picture that shows the top view of that assembly.

image

And here is the image with some annotation to show the main components where they are in the assembly.

image image

Now, the moment of truth! Will it work? Will the motor be powerful enought to move the mirror? The assembly doesn't look particularly great and there are so many wonky bits where friction and additional unwanted forces may be generated. So, to test to see if it will actually move, I used the same code as the final code from my previous blog, and modified durations (sleep in between direction change) for azimuth motor to be 10 sec and for the elevation motor to be 1 sec. Also, to be clear, I had replicated elevation motor to do the same as azimuth motor as in, I instructed them to go back and forth with full speed.

Ta-da! Here is the video! Smiley

You don't have permission to edit metadata of this video.
Edit media
x
image
Upload Preview
image

Now I need to add sensors and make it work autonomously to reflect the light onto chosen spot. I will need some photo sensors, too which I had forgotten to mention in my previous blogs. In my next blog, I will show the full system build (sensors, actuators, controller, etc.).

Previous                                                                                                                                                                              Next

  • Sign in to reply
  • hitesh.boghani
    hitesh.boghani over 1 year ago in reply to DAB

    Well noticed! The deflection in the mirror is actually because of long term storage in that position. Mirror is made up of some kind of polymer and not glass so it is quite light. It doesn't have enough weight to give itself the deflection. Saying that though, when I will transfer this onto the large size mirror, I will need to take this issue seriously and provide a frame to support to mirror properly. Thanks for advice! Slight smile

    • Cancel
    • Vote Up 0 Vote Down
    • Sign in to reply
    • More
    • Cancel
  • DAB
    DAB over 1 year ago

    Nice build, but as you can see, you are getting mirror deflection, which will reduce the amount of light on the areas you want.

    • Cancel
    • Vote Up 0 Vote Down
    • Sign in to reply
    • More
    • Cancel
element14 Community

element14 is the first online community specifically for engineers. Connect with your peers and get expert answers to your questions.

  • Members
  • Learn
  • Technologies
  • Challenges & Projects
  • Products
  • Store
  • About Us
  • Feedback & Support
  • FAQs
  • Terms of Use
  • Privacy Policy
  • Legal and Copyright Notices
  • Sitemap
  • Cookies

An Avnet Company © 2025 Premier Farnell Limited. All Rights Reserved.

Premier Farnell Ltd, registered in England and Wales (no 00876412), registered office: Farnell House, Forge Lane, Leeds LS12 2NE.

ICP 备案号 10220084.

Follow element14

  • X
  • Facebook
  • linkedin
  • YouTube