Any thoughts on the ‘spring’ for the ratchet design I posted?
I have some 1/64" plywood and was thinking of cutting a 1mm strip from that, turned sideways. The range of motion required should only be a mm or two. The arm would then be straight, and I’d glue a half-circle to glue to the end to engage the gear. The 1/64" ply is unfinished, so any number of adhesives would work - probably just use regular wood glue or CA.
Also going to use rings of vinyl as spacers to give me a tiny bit of wiggle room. I have many to choose from but I have some that is as thin as a sheet of paper.
I had better luck with a gravity-fed ratchet, but I don’t think that fits your need here.
I needed strength and was mounted vertically. I think the method you talked about should work. I have done that style before also and it should meet your need.
Although I suspect your design(s) used thicker material, what did you use for a spring? I would have liked to use a steel spring and ball-bearing, but not much to choose from that’s 1mm in diameter… I just cut a small test sample from the same 1mm acrylic and although it flexes just fine, I doubt it would hold up like the 1/64mm ply…
I was using medium clear acrylic or thick green-glass acrylic. Your materials are thinner, but your design shouldn’t require as much resistance as mine did either. I did have this balanced, using it on each side of the gear, not just in one place.
Are you looking for a nice stop indicator, or are you wanting it to prevent it from going backwards?
I did want to stick this link in for reference. It does fall into the fairly complicated but Martin Raynsford has a nice one for free download for others who might wish to follow down the deeper rabbit hole.
And here is a simple one. But having a ratchet mechanism would be handy.
Just wanted to take a moment to say thank you. I am trying to get back to this project. It’s not crucial but I enjoy the process of designing and assembling little things like this. Your file gave me some ideas that I am trying to incorporate into what I had already come up with, but needed to re-draw due to errors I mentioned above.