Landing Gear Lever - via Compliant Mechanism

I’ve been tinkering and trying to work out a landing gear lever that would be a simple thingiverse download and 3D printed option for any who would like it. But I’m still trying to nut it out.
One of the reasons I chose to go with compliant mechanism is that it has a satisfying ‘clunk’ when homed at either extent of travel, and apparently you’ll get millions of cycles out of them. (the actual switches maybe not though)

for any of you not familiar with compliant mechanisms, have a gander at this amazing vid
around timestamp 3:34 is the bistable switch that I based this design off.

enjoy

PS: disregard the 3 colours, this mechanism is all one piece, but I had to model seperate components in order to create joints to animate it.

9 Likes

Do you deliver to Italy?

2 Likes

Nice! I’ve been tinkering a bit on paper with a more traditional design, with a download override and a firm spring/notch system to simulate the gear switch from a modern airliner. Though to be quite honest I prefer your design!

I’d been enviously looking at some of the landing gear designs and pondering building my own, the mechanisms have been dutifully recreated, but when I came across the compliant mechanism video & heard them discussing the satisfying clunk of the switches, I had a little light bulb moment & realised it would be perfect for a landing gear lever.

@komemiute I am intending to put this up on thingiverse once I have worked out the kinks.
I will publish it as a free download. Im still thinking about what might be the best / most popular way to mount it amongst other things. I’d like to make it as much of an all rounder in terms of being a simple & attractive solution for most people.

A tip of the hat to @Troll for his guidance/mentoring, much appreciated.

3 Likes

Interesting design.

From time to time I think about building my own gear lever mechanism. My requirement would be to have a third neutral position in the middle for the MiG collection…

Thanks man! I thoroughly appreciate!

in the meantime, there are existing compliant mechanisms

that have been shared by BYU

this is the switch that I am basing my lever design off.

I started thinking about how to design a tristable compliant mechanism.
Googled it.
My brain melted…

1 Like

yup, im still trying to get my head around the traditional joint mechanism to animate and work out the compliant mechanism for a bistable

good luck with a tri-stable

3 Likes

Sorry for the revive, but @gadget - where are you with this now? I might have an idea or two…

1 Like

i got into CNC & have been flat out designing building sim pits & panels
haven’t revisited this post purchasing the book from their university & trying to work through the math…
unfortunately at this point in my skillset, its a bit beyond me & i have too many other projects distracting me

2 Likes

Haha no worries, I had almost completely forgotten about this!

yeah as much as I’d love to be able to leverage on the existing work that they have done, it’s doubtful i’d get anywhere trying to do little more than tweek their designs slightly to fit & I definitely wouldnt be getting the math correct, just eyeballing the model…

1 Like