EksoZeroG
The EksoZeroG is a product that attaches to an aerial lift or scaffolding and uses two spring-arms to counterbalance the weight of heavy tools.
I designed a webbing strap that cinches around tools of many shapes and sizes and has multiple loops to allow for height adjustment. This simple solution saved countless hours of designing tool holders for hundreds of different tools.
When user testing, we noticed construction workers constantly adjusted the L-shaped tool post to keep it from rotating. I created a spring pin/detent mechanism that holds the tool post at one of eight different orientations and allows the worker to focus on his or her task.
Because the spring arms are expected to move up and down millions of times over the course of many years, I ran a fatigue analysis to make sure the arm links would survive. I started with static hand calculations, created a model in Excel, and finished with FEA in SolidWorks Simulation. Using the minimum and maximum stress values, I made sure that the links would survive millions of cycles.
With the team convinced that the part would pass our fatigue testing, I drafted the drawings, focusing on lining up the bearing bores with GD&T.
