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Capstan Drive — Aaed Musa

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Gears are the common choice for a speed reducer in robotics, but I have a few points of contention. Gears have backlash which limits precision. Gearboxes can also be a bit loud especially if 3D printed. While it is possible to reduce backlash and noise with high-precision metal gears, purchasing such gears can be quite expensive. The solution to this is a rope-driven reducer called a Capstan Drive. I stumbled across this unique reducer when I discovered Stanley, a 12DOF quadrupedal robot by the company Ahead.IO. Considering that Capstan drives are not very popular, they quickly piqued my interest. There is a lot of considerations that go into designing a capstan drive and the main one is rope selection. I started my rope selection journey with stainless steel wire which was a prospect short-lived. I had originally built a test actuator with the stainless steel wire and let it run continuously. After 4 short hours later, the wire broke. I ran two more trials and the wire continued to br

Capstan Drive (05/31/2024) About Gears are the common choice for a speed reducer in robotics, but I have a few points of contention. Gears have backlash which limits precision. Gearboxes can also be a bit loud especially if 3D printed. While it is possible to reduce backlash and noise with high-precision metal gears, purchasing such gears can be quite expensive. The solution to this is a rope-driven reducer called a Capstan Drive. I stumbled across this unique reducer when I discovered Stanley , a 12DOF quadrupedal robot by the company Ahead.IO . Considering that Capstan drives are not very po

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