The Trautman Hook · 10 February 06 by Jesse Crossen
We have made a preliminary prototype of the Trautman Hook. After Kenneth Heide, CPO generously lent us two used hooks and two new ones, we reverse engineered them and made a CAD model in Alibre Design. Below is the original hook and a picture of our CAD model:
We made some small changes to the design based on the areas where the used hooks had been broken and welded back together, and there are probably more opportunities for stengthening and weight reduction. As soon as we had finished the model, we emailed it to Bill Watson at Anvil Prototype & Design, who printed it on his Z Corp rapid prototyping machine and filled it with cyanoacrylate (super glue) for strength. We we able to assemble the parts into a moving model to test the design:
The back lock works perfectly, but the opening action is a little rough at the beginning. This may be due to the high friction between the rapid prototyped surfaces or it may be a geometric issue; we will do more testing to resolve the problem. Our next step is to refine the model and try casting it in metal. Thanks to Anvil Prototype & Design for donating fast, high quality rapid prototyping services.
You can download the CAD model (3.7M zipped) if you want to experiment. Warning: This version is largely untested and may not work as intended.
