Design and Build a T-Shirt Cannon Firing Mechanism

The work in this paper is a part of the T-shirt cannon automation project. The objective of the project is to develop an autonomous robot carrying cannons to automatically shoot T-shirts during the sports events at the University of Cincinnati (UC). More specifically, the T-shirt cannon will be used and driven by the UC cheerleading team and be able to automatically shoot T-shirts at the audience in the Nippert Stadium and the 5/3 Arena for football and basketball games, respectively. The design and automation of the T-shirt cannon require a significant effort and a multi-disciplinary team to complete. This paper will focus on the process of designing, building, and testing the firing mechanism for the cannon, including the determination of cannon’s firing method, barrel design and assembly, base design and barrel mounting method, pneumatic analysis, and automation and control of the firing of T-shirts. The goal of the firing mechanism is that the cannon would fire off as many T-shirts as possible with the window of a single timeout at the game. The project starts with the preliminary research and the initial testing. During the preliminary research, the relevant safety standards/codes and previous T-shirt cannon designs were reviewed and studied. Especially the possible working with pressurized air, the material used in the design must be rated above the target firing pressure to ensure the cannon itself not explode and the air supply tank and fittings must be in good condition. During the initial testing, the site visits were conducted, the cheerleaders were interviewed, the dimensions of the stadium and the 5/3 arena were measured, and therefore the shooting distance and shooting angles were estimated. After the initial testing and preliminary research, a set of engineering characteristics were established, following by the concept design, in which the barrel assembly, the pneumatics, the firing mechanism, and the mounting method were discussed, analyzed, and determined. The barrels had two major designs, one is using a railing support system with an external tank of air to power and fire the cannon, and another one is using a chamber of air to power and fire the cannon with the barrels surrounding the air chamber itself. Two methods are analyzed and compared. The optimum one, therefore, was determined and developed. For the firing mechanism, two main designs are a spring-loaded firing mechanism that could increase the sealing capabilities of the barrels, and a tight tolerance fit that has less weight. Two designs were tested and analyzed, the optimum one was determined and built, followed by the firing mechanism testing. This paper will describe the process of design, building, and testing the firing mechanisms of this T-shirt cannon at UC. The paper will also discuss the testing results on shooting performance.