Remote Controlled Wall-e U Command Forklift/Stacker With Fusion 360

In this Instructable I will show how I designed and made a Forklift Attachment for the Wall-e U Command, doing any project where a Wall-e is involved always makes me smile for some reason, anyway I thought this might be a bit of fun so here goes!

This Wall-e purchased for parts is turning out to be quite useful for these Remote Control Projects, having completed an earlier Nerf Turret Wall-E Instructable which worked really well, the beauty of this big Wall-e is that you can easily hide all the components inside the body.

I will be using a FLYSKY FS-16x for the transmitter and a FLYSKY 10 Channel receiver.

I've added a Servo driven Tilt Mechanism to the mast and for carriage lifting up and down I'm using a TT motor as a 2 cable winch used with a 10amp esc.

I'm making this up as I go along as usual so it should be Interesting: Onto Fusion 360

Fusion 360

3D Printer

1.75 PLA

FLYSKY FS-i6 Transmitter and Receiver

Any suitable tracked or wheeled chassis

TT dc-motor 3-6 volt or 6-12 volt

10 amp cheap ESC for the DC motor

Servo Motors for both Mast tilting and head movement, I've used 996 type 0-180 degree Servos.

Suitable battery pack, I'm using a Ni-Mh pack 6Volt it lasts for ages.

Hot Glue

CA Glue

Brass bar and Pulleys for the cord

Popsicle sticks

This part is just for guidance really as I swopped and changed ideas as I went along in the design, but the main part the mast and carriage is there with Screen shots to give you the general idea, also check the mast and carriage photos to see how I made the components as its difficult to explain not knowing the correct terminology for forklift parts, I just made things up as I went along.

The Main thing here is proportion, so with the Wall-e in hand I take a few dimensions, the first item to sketch is the component which will be fixed on the front of the Wall-e this works out at 99mm across the Wall-e, I made it 20mm deep and extruded this to 4mm, the next is to sketch into this the stand offs, this will be where the mast will swivel on 2 points, the screenshots explain better, but 2 rectangles each side of the component, extruded to 20mm a slot down the centre where the mast fixing will slide into, fillets to the corner angles and 5.3mm holes to accept a 5mm Allen head bolt.

With these dimensions we have an idea how wide to make mast, the mast is basically 2 channels, I didn't make these long enough initially and had to cut and glue some extra channel in place.

I sketched a "H" Section, one side was slightly thicker to stop flexing:) extruded this to what I thought would be a good length but had to add more channel, bit of a faff gluing together and sanding but all good in the end.

With the mast lengths sketched and extruded, I could now make a cap for the top of the mast, the 2 mast channels would be glued into this, ensure these are at 45 degrees and tight to the edges as it's our guide for the rest of the mast build.

I made some brackets for the back of the mast in 3 positions and glued these in place.

I now needed to sketch 2 brackets for the bottom of the mast so the mast can be attached to the Wall-e with 5mm Allen head bolts, these are just centre rectangles 20mm height and the width of the mast then extruded to 20mm for clearance, then a centre rectangle on the top surface, this needs to fit in between the brackets we have already made on the Wall-e, the corners are filleted and a 5.3mm hole through for the pivot bolts, these are then glued into position on the rear of the mast at approximately 50mm up from the bottom.

Designing the carriage and forks.

I basically just looked at forklift images for this part, then using the mast dimensions, I sketched a centre square approx 115mm then extruded to 5mm and then messed with it so it looked something like a a carriage on a Forklift, I cut a rectangular slot out at the top then made a vertical rail then using the square pattern made this into 5 rails, the dimensions didn't come out exactly right end to end but it looked ok, I then sketched in on a side plane the part where the forks would slide along, with this sketched and extruded I could then make the Forks, check the photos out of the mast for clarity of what I mean, I just looked at images of fork lift trucks for this part, the forks taper and can slide along the carriage for different positions, these were a bit loose when printed so I drilled small holes underneath and used screws to hold in place:) it worked a treat and not seen.

I will make the back of the carriage the bit which will slide up and down in the mast separate rather than 3D print the whole thing.

To sketch the slider, I projected the bottom of the mast channels and made a rectangle then off set this inwards and went from there, extend that to approx 40mm so it would fit onto the back of the carriage, with all the carriage components sketched I 3D printed them, and then glued everything into position, I then made a small bracket for the Servo Tilt arm, I did this on just one side of the Mast .

The Mast and carriage are now complete, the carriage does slide up and down the mast channel, but testing later will see if it works correctly or not.

Servo Mast Tilt next:

Mast tilting is common on Forklifts, the forklift driver adjusts the tilt when entering a pallet, then lifts slightly and tilts back with the load, so with this in mind I made a simple tilt system, using a 996 Servo with a servo horn, I position this inside the Wall-e body then using the top of the Servo horn I marked a position on the front so I could drill for the control arm to the mast bracket, I glued the mast tilt bracket in place I used a linkage stopper connector to secure the linkage, using the z end to secure to the Servo arm, I then hot glued the Servo into position.

Now its time to put in place the motor for the carriage lifter.

Forklifts are normally hydraulic, no chance of doing that so I opted for a hoist/winch type arrangement using a cheap TT motor, some of these motors have a black disc which is on the inner leg of the motor, I found 2 of these and secured them in place using screws and CA glue.

There is enough room underneath the Wall-e to fit the motor, placing it as far forward as I could so as not to interfere with the mast when tilted forward, I soldered some wires in place then secured underneath with Hot Glue, for the control cables I used 1mm black waxed cord, this is pushed through 2 holes in the back of the carriage, I made a couple of rollers from Pulleys and brass bar for the top of the mast, the cord goes over the pulleys then down to the motor, I pushed through the cord from the inside of the black disc then superglued each one to the disc.

Now to the connections and test lift.

For the most part the Wall-e was already done as far as drive train is concerned, I had used it in a previous project, I have used the head of the Wall-e for this project and the head is driven by a 996 servo secured with hot glue to the top plate, I also attached the arms but no servos to these on this occasion just hot glue.

We are using a FLYSKY FS-i6x and a 10 channel Receiver to control all Servo and motormovements, for the TT motor a 10amp ESC is used, these are really cheap and perfect for this type of project as they can drive the motor forwards as well as backwards.

The drive train connections are in Channels 1 and 2 which is the right stick on the transmitter, the motor and esc is in channel 5 this provides the power to the receiver via the 6v Ni-mh Battery pack which is velcro'd to the back of the Wall-e this makes great ballast for the forklift as well, the tilt servo channel 6 channels 5 and 6 are knobs, I thought it would be easier to control hoist and tilt movements this way, and finally the head movements are controlled by channel 4

With everything connected it's time to test the mast and carriage movements plus the drive train and head movements.

Well things started off well enough, the tilt movement worked great, the carriage hoisting up and down was another matter, it kept jamming in the channel, I had to ditch the 3D printed slider in the end and make a new slider, this time I used lolly sticks, appears to be less friction, anyway it worked great in the end.

If I would do anything to improve this project I would make Wall-e's head go up and down and have his eyes lighting up, but for now this will do just fine, it works better than what I imagined and great fun, plus the whole thing makes me smile which is what it's all about.

Hope you enjoyed the Instructable and thanks for looking.