I led a team in the Manufacturing Workcell category at the National Robotics Challenge. We built an autonomous 3D print farm: two Voron printers, a Cartesian gantry, and a plate swapping system that moved finished prints to a shelf and started the next job.
It took the Gold Award and the Honda Innovation Award in our category in 2025.
A live Onshape model of every subsystem, so the mechanical, electrical, and software groups worked from one source of truth. Configurable extrusion and hardware libraries kept the unique part count down and made BOM generation quicker.
A Cartesian gantry with a dual leadscrew Z axis and a belt driven X axis, both stepper driven, with limit switches at each end for leveling and homing. The X axis carries a custom screw tensioner for the GT2 belt. V groove extrusions and V wheels serve as the linear guides.
A forklift style mechanism that pulls finished prints off the bed. Oversized build plates hang a strip off the side of the heater; the forklift inserts from both sides and, using embedded magnets and the gantry's Z motion, lifts the plate clear. That same strip then rests on the plate holders as the gantry drops it into the shelf.
The extension uses a two stage belt drive for reach, on drawer slides picked for their thin profile and stiffness. The magnets removed the need for grippers.
Aluminum extrusion shelving for the stacked printer assembly, housing two Voron 2.4 printers and the plate holders. The back left array holds a limit switch in every rung, so the software can check whether a plate was deposited or picked up instead of assuming it.
A GitHub Projects workspace with a live Gantt chart, aligning deliverables across the hardware and software sub-teams and surfacing blockers early.
National Robotics Challenge, Manufacturing Workcell category
2025National Robotics Challenge
2025