DESIGN AND CONSTRUCTION OF ELECTROMAGNETIC METAL CHIPS COLLECTING MACHINE USING LOCALLY SOURCED MATERIAL

Abstract

An Electromagnetic metal chip collecting trolley has been designed and fabricated to reduce the labour and time involved in metal chips collection. The machine is incorporated with an electromagnet made up of an insulated enamelled wire wound on three iron rod bolted on a metal plate. The magnetized metal plate having total field strength of 2084.5 AT/m is required to pick total of 1kg of metal chips when the system is connected to a 12 volts, 40Amperes DC power supply. The DC battery also powers a 12 volts dc motor with the torque of 5.34Nm required to turn the electromagnet housing for discharging the collected metal chips. The drive mechanism is achieved via the help of four contact bearings and a bevel gear arrangement. The whole mechanisms are controlled by the operator via switches fitted on the machine handle. This machine is four wheeled with the two front wheels having two degrees of freedom (DOF) for easy directional movements