Overview: This custom-built tool streamlines the process of solar panel installation by combining automated positioning, ergonomic handling, and precision placement features. Designed as part of a robotics engineering project focused on renewable energy deployment.
We were tasked by array technologies to take there manual slide hammer tool and make something that would be easier and less physically demanding to use. So we came up with a design that utilizes an off-the-shelf battery powered automatic tool and retrofitted it to fit our needs.
These are some pictures of their manual slide hammer tool
We took the skil auto hammer, which is a tool originally desinged for driving nails into wood, and modified the barrel of it to allow us to use the slide hammer tool head. We used CAD modeling and 3D printing to rapidly produce and test our prototypes and then ordered a stronger 3D printed metal version as our final product .The skil auto hammer uses a rapid firing piston for its original purpose, but this is also exactly what we needed to help us drive the clips into the solar panel mounting brackets.
As you can see based on the videos our tool is extremly effective at its job. It is faster, more powerful, less fatigue inducing. and easier to use while also being cost effective for Array to procure and produce the required parts to make this tool functional.
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