I'm Akash Ramaswamy and here are some engineering projects I've worked on.

Please enjoy!

Robotic Spherical Parallel Manipulator

What?

Final Year Project with Monash Nova Rover (MNR).
Purpose: To improve upon previous 3-DoF robotic wrist joint, focusing on weight and budget.

How?

Inspired from Agile Eye & Wrist research papers by Gosselin and Angeles.
Project involved extensive use of CAD, FEA, 3D printing, machining and gear cutting.

Result

Reduced weight by 33% and cost by more than 50% compared to previous robotic wrist design.
Learned and improved many skills during the process.

Automated Plugboard Tester (Ongoing)

What?

Railway relay plugboards (shown above) have indexed holes to ensure the correct relay can be plugged in.
Created a plugboard tester, to verify correct drilling of the indexed holes.

How?

Result

Gear Cutting and Machining

What?

For a Spherical Parallel Manipulator robot I was designing, torque needed to be transferred at an angle of 54.74°.
Many solutions were investigated, involving universal joints, Rzeppa joints and flexible shafts, until I settled on bevel gears.

How?

As 54.74° was not a standard bevel gear size, custom gears needed to be machined.
I had no experience with gear cutting and so I needed to learn from scratch.

Result

Through YouTube tutorials and tinkering, I successfully learnt how to cut my own gears
I learnt a lot about good mechanical design and machining practices.

Monash Nova Rover Robot Arm Team Leader

What?

In 2020, I was elected as the Robotic Arm Team Lead at Monash Nova Rover, an engineering student team specialising in the development of analogous Mars rovers.
This involved leading a subteam of 10 student engineers in the design and construction of a 6-DoF robotic arm, capable of lifting loads of up to 5kg, and performing dextrous tasks such as inserting USB drives and typing on keyboards.
This video (right) gives a short summary of the achievements of the year.

Robotic End-effector

What?

In 2019, my first project on Monash Nova Rover was to design and manufacture an end-effector for the team's robotic arm.

How?

The end-effector uses left hand and right hand leadscrews actuated by a double shafted worm gear drive to move the jaws in opposite directions, providing a simple way to provide a powerful grip.
The build utilizes welded aluminium sheet to provide a strong, lightweight and aesthetic design.

Result

The resulting end-effector has been used for 3 years and has performed reliably at international competitions like URC, with little maintenance.

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