Whirls design

To create strands from 1 or several yarns a device called whirls is needed.

For this project I decided to create a ropewalk which makes ropes with 3 strands.

It should be as simple as possible, so in my mind I already figured out what I would need to make the whirls to work and I build it more or less from material I had lying around in my basement/scrapbox, except for the three toothed pulleys and the toothed belt itself.

The bearings I used are from worn-out wheels from a pair of in-liners and the size fits almost perfectly with the "spacer M4 M-F"

I decided that 1 bearing could do the job, and "glued" them (and the spacers) in place with CA-glue.

To keep it as simple as possible I fitted the motor on a bracket, and used brackets as well to mount the construction onto the baseplate.

I only needed to use 2 wires of the motor (the 3 others are used to count the RPM of the motor).

With this simple design the whirls are DC motor driven and turn smooth & synchronously. Amazing what CA glue is capable of J