Vacuum gripper

Parts

This is the vacuum pump that I ordered for the first version of a vacuum cup gripper:

I'll use this pump in the first design spiral, just to make sure that it's drawing a sufficient vacuum to pick up parts.

Various vacuum cups to try out.

Vacuum gripper 1

How much weight can it lift?

Here's a manual SMD pick-and-place test:

This vacuum cup accidentally rotates the part when the vacuum is turned on. I'll modify the gripper to fit a different vacuum cup and 3D print again.

Vacuum gripper 2

The shorter vacuum cup works nicely.

Design file

Download vacuum gripper 2 CAD file

Future versions

Eventually I'd like to integrate the vacuum pump into the end effector. I could try a cheap micro vacuum pump like this:

But a more exciting option for a self-replicating bot is this MIT design:

This micro vacuum pump is FDM 3D printed and can go -220 Torr below atmospheric pressure.

A miniaturized version of this MIT design may work even better:

This FDM 3D printed peristaltic vacuum pump goes -750 Torr below atmospheric pressure, down to an incredible 10 Torr! It's much too big for a Baksi tool, but a miniaturized version with a tiny gearmotor might have good performance and fabricatability.