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Electrical Issues: Hatch Lift - Battletech Pod - Tail Gate Lift Motor

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kahlid74:

--- Quote from: bkenobi on January 29, 2013, 01:32:37 pm ---If you were to have the door slide, using a pressure switch of some kind would work great.  But, this arrangement is rotating.  If you set the pressure switch to an appropriate value such that a limb won't be severed near the bottom of the door, there's likely enough force on top of the cab next to the hinge to remove a finger real clean like!  I love the concept, but I'm wondering if you might be better off with either:

* A sliding door as suggested earlier
* Making the gap between the doors larger such that a finger or small person's arm would not be injured by a closure (~2" seems safe to me).  You can use some type of rubber molding to mate the 2 surfaces such that they still seal tightly.
This is a hobby that should be fun.  Rushing to the ER with a finger in ziplock doesn't sound fun IMO.

--- End quote ---

Thanks for the feedback!

I feel like if I used the sliding door the same issue would be present.  To prevent a swing of the door I would solidly hook it to the chassis and then it would have the same ability to lop a finger off. 

Making the gap larger kind of gets away from what I was going for with it blocking out all light from the outside world but in the end, we'll see what I can work out.

bkenobi:
No matter how you make the door move, if it is controlled by a motor there will always be a risk of injury unless the motor is not strong enough to cause said injury.  Of course, you can have just as serious a problem with a motor that fails and allows the door to drop.  I'm not in the automobile industry, but I'm confident that there has been a lot of work done on this topic in regards to tailgates.

I saw an episode of Top Gear where they showed a Cadillac with a mechanism that would automatically latch when the trunk lid got within an inch or so of closed.  This seems like a cool feature, but they termed it the "finger amputator" (or something like that).

kahlid74:

--- Quote from: bkenobi on January 29, 2013, 02:20:54 pm ---No matter how you make the door move, if it is controlled by a motor there will always be a risk of injury unless the motor is not strong enough to cause said injury.  Of course, you can have just as serious a problem with a motor that fails and allows the door to drop.  I'm not in the automobile industry, but I'm confident that there has been a lot of work done on this topic in regards to tailgates.

I saw an episode of Top Gear where they showed a Cadillac with a mechanism that would automatically latch when the trunk lid got within an inch or so of closed.  This seems like a cool feature, but they termed it the "finger amputator" (or something like that).

--- End quote ---

If you ever get a chance or want to dig into it, the electrical guides for the Hatch Lift gate powered mechanism are a fantastic read.  Currently, all doors have two motors, one for the lift/close action and one for the latch.  So the latch you talk about is found in every trunk that automatically closes, which are millions of cars.  I'm not saying it's not dangerous, but it's been proven to be minimal.  Minimal still doesn't remove the fact that it can occur though.

So with either resistance sensors or plane threshold sensors the clutch would break the motion of the motor in milliseconds which, if you watch it slow motion would not remove a finger but crimp/bruise it.

At the end of the day I really appreciate your feedback and it makes me re-think the design.  I still want to do this to fruition and see how it works.  Once completed I'll see how bad it really is and then work with it or re-work it.

Just a side note, machines that are super dangerous can still be prevented from causing any harm.  Just look at the sawstop.

jammin0:
Build away man.  I think this is pretty sweet.  Instead of worrying too much about safety, simply worry about disassociating yourself with anyone who is so accident prone as to stick their finger in a closing door.  WWDS What would Darwin say.

Seriously though, make sure you get a video up as soon as that sucker is working.  Super cool idea.  I'm glad that the nearest salvage yard is 45 minutes away from me. :applaud:

bkenobi:
I agree!  Build it and let nature take it's course.  From what I'm imagining in my head, this thing should look awesome when complete.   :cheers:

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