3D Printed Geneva Drive

This project was originally posted on notes.robives.com

The Geneva Drive is an elegant mechanism used to convert rotary motion into intermittent motion. There is a YouTube video above as well as on my Instagram feed.

I’ve designed the parts for this project in Autodesk Fusion 360. If you have access to a 3D you can follow these construction instructions to make your own 3D printed Geneva Drive.
Download the STL files from the geneva.zip link above. They should be suitable for most 3D printers. I printed the parts out in a variety of colours of PLA from rigid.ink using an Ultimaker 2.

Here are the five parts ready for assembly.You will also need some cyano glue a small screw and a washer.

A dot of cyano glue holds the handle and crank together.

Thread the crank through the hole in the base.

Fit the drive wheel to the crank. A dot of cyano holds the drive wheel onto place. Make sure that it turns freely.

Fit the Geneva wheel over the pin on the base so that it lines up with the drive wheel as shown.

A small screw and washer holds the Geneva wheel into place. Don’t over tighten it as the wheel needs to be able to turn freely.

That’s it! Turn the handle on your completed Geneva Drive to make it work.