2010

Nordco Railroad
Spike Automatic
Loader
Senior Design Project

Richie Frye, Tyler Fouks, & Mike Sorensen

University of Wisconsin Milwaukee
12/1/2010
 I. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
The railroad system is something that is taken for granted in this country. When we order
our products from across the country we expect to receive them in a timely manner and are not so
much concerned with how it gets here. Today railroads are built, maintained and serviced by
large “gangs” of machinery consisting of multiple units with their own tasks. These gang units
include spikers, tie pullers/placers, and ballast renewal machines. To ensure that the railroad
transportation process is working at its highest efficiency, these gang units must also be operating
at their optimum performance. Any increase that can be made in the throughput of these
machines is an improvement to our society as a whole.

For this project, our group was assigned the task of helping Nordco; a South Milwaukee
company specializing in railroad equipment to further increase the efficiency of their spiker unit.
We were asked to develop a method to automate the process of loading railroad spikes into the
gun. This process has of loading spikes, has been done manually by an employee up until this
point.

Prior to our involvement with this project, Nordco had developed a process to accomplish
this task. While they accomplished their goal they were not quite content with the performance
and sought after a “second opinion”. When offered to see their design we opted to utilize our past
four years of school and our personal experiences to guide us to our solution. In doing so, we
came up with many new and innovative ideas to carry out the task at hand. Throughout the
process, we met with the company: each time we left knowing that we had shown them
something they hadn’t thought of before, which was very rewarding.

We felt the drawback from Nordco’s current design was most likely its complexity. The
way Mr. Weber, the engineering manager, spoke about the process, made it seem very difficult
and potentially prone to problems. This was something that we focused on as a group; keep it
simple. The final design can be seen in Figure 4,Figure 5, and Figure 6 and utilizes gravity,
vibration, a rotary coil drive, and a push rod to take the railroad spikes from a completely random
bulk bin to individualized and oriented on a track to the spiker loader. To follow, will be an in-
depth explanation of the entire method and process. Some portions of the design are theoretical
while others have been proven and prototyped.

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 II. CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
Implantation of our final design can be done in many fashions due to the fact that the
arrangement of the tractor is easy to manipulate. This is due to the fact that all of the
components are powered by means of hydraulics or electricity and rearrangement of the supply
would not cause much concern. As the design is today, the motor and accessories are in the front
portion of the tractor while the bin holding all of the spikes resides in the back portion of the
machine. Our recommendation of implementation would include switching these two to limit
exposure of the hazardous spike environment to the employees. We would also recommend the
altering of the bin so that the design could be multiplied to increase the feed rate if need be. The
process length is not defined in this paper as it can be shorted and lengthened to tailor it to the
specific needs of the tractor. We would recommend that the final design be manufactured out of
heavy gauge steel similar to the existing products.

Through the process of this design there was a lot gained in terms of experience outside of
what we learn through our average curriculum. The importance of time management, team
focused design, as well as the impacts of failure were things we gained that will prepare us for our
future work experience. With this project we had to face strict deadlines as well as the standards
of success and quality that were defined from the beginning. We learned very quickly that things
do not happen fast and nothing gets done by itself. It was up to each member of the team to keep
themselves focused and driven to succeed in this project. Adaptation to failure was one of the
most unique aspects of this project, as that cannot be taught in classroom setting. All-in-all this
was a very unique and education experience that will leave us better prepared for our future
experiences.

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 TABLE OF CONTENTS

I. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY ..................................................................................................... 2

II. CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS ................................................................... 3

III. DETAILED STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM ................................................................ 5

IV. PROPOSED SOLUTION OF THE PROBLEM ................................................................. 5

V. DETAILS OF THE DESIGN CONTRIBUTION OF EACH TEAM MEMBER ....................... 11

Richie Frye ............................................................................................................................................ 11

Tyler Fouks ........................................................................................................................................... 14

Mike Sorensen ...................................................................................................................................... 17

VI. DESIGN EVALUATION................................................................................................. 20

Sorting Operation 1: Spikes Hang By Head in Slot ............................................................................. 20

Drive Operation: Spikes Enter Drive Coil ........................................................................................... 22

Sorting Operation 2: Spikes Encounter Stop on Rail .......................................................................... 24

Sorting Operation 3: Spikes Encounter Pusher ...................................................................................25

Summary of Final Design .....................................................................................................................27

VII. ECONOMIC ANALYSIS ................................................................................................ 28

VIII. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS .............................................................................................. 29

IX. APPENDIX.................................................................................................................... 30

1. Final Design................................................................................................................................. 30

2. Concept Drawings ........................................................................................................................ 33

3. Prototypes .................................................................................................................................... 41

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 III. DETAILED STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM

The process of spiking the rail to the railroad tie is much like that of a nail gun fastening two
pieces of wood together; except the spike is inserted through the use of a jackhammer. Unlike a
nail gun, where all of the nails are neatly organized; railroad spikes come in a bin; looking more
like a box of nails. During the process of spiking the rail; the operator needs to remove spikes
from the bin and load them into the spiker gun. This process takes additional manpower and
slows down the production speed. Nordco would like to automate the way that the spike guns are
loaded.

IV. PROPOSED SOLUTION OF THE PROBLEM

To design an automation process is obviously going to involve a lot of brainstorming, proof of
concept, as well as prototyping due to the fact that it is such a custom job. For automation there
is no one size fits all application. In our groups case, we started by deciding we are going to break
this process out into stages. The stages or portions of the process that would need to be
accomplished were:

1. Bulk to Individual
a. The spikes start out in a large bin, much like you would see when you
open up a box of nails from the store. We knew that eventually we
would need to individually orient these spikes so one of the tasks was
to gain isolated control of the spikes.
2. Axial Orientation
a. Based on the geometry of the spikes, we decided a starting point would
be to position them all on the same axis.
3. Preliminary Head Orientation
a. Knowing that the final orientation requires the spikes all facing the
same direction, this process orients the heads in two or three directions
allowing the following process to complete the total orientation.
4. Final Orientation
a. The final orientation requires that the spikes be upright with the head
of the spike oriented in a proper direction as to allow the offset of the
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 head to grab the rail. There will be four orientations needed for the
rail, 2 directions on each rail.

While these functional requirements were what our group were faced with, we also had
other requirements we were going to need to constrain ourselves to:

1. Keep it simple
a. Having a complex design for this process would most likely bring down
the reliability and therefore would not be likely that Nordco would end
up using the design in the end.
b. Complexity adds probability for failure
2. Speed
a. In the current system, the manual loader can load about 40 spikes per
minute so it was important that we did not fall below this point and if
we could improve this would come as a bonus.
3. Cost and Manufacturability
a. We needed a design that we could work within a short time frame
b. Production of the end design needs to be something easily
implemented and manufactured.
c. Use of existing components and materials

To begin the design process we started with concept drawings. Each of the team members
put their thoughts to paper. The task was to take the whole process as we saw it happening in our
minds and try our best to put these thoughts into a media we could all evaluate and make
decisions. Our Conceptual drawings can be referenced in the appendix. After gathering a few
designs we broke it down into the stages that are noted above and started to evaluate process and
directions we would like to consider.

For the first stage of orientation we came up with three concepts to consider. These
concepts dealt with using the body of the spike to our advantage, using mechanical and electrical
systems to separate spikes, and using gravity and vibration to help spikes to orient themselves.

Design 1 consisted of an idea where we took smaller samples of the spikes, between 5 and
15, and put them in a grove that utilized the geometry of the head to orient the spikes. This would
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work on the idea that the only way the spikes would pass through the channel in the proper way
would be to fall into the grove and proceed to the next step. This process would accomplish not
only the axial orientation but it would also have the head in the upright position; accomplishing
two requirements with one step.

The second design can be seen in the conceptual drawings Figure 8 and Figure 9. This
design uses rotating, individualizing drum that will theoretically grab small bundles of pins and
drop them down a sloped plane to a conveyer belt. This belt will then push them to a channel
which, much like design 1 will only allow them to proceed in the upright and axially oriented
arrangement.

The third design would be to use a robotic picker arm. In this concept, we would use an
extremely expensive arm to pull individual spikes from the large bin and load them into the tracks
for the spiker gun. This process would only be able to handle one spike at a time and may not be
fast enough, as Nordco advised.

Decision Matrix 1

Issue: Simplicity Speed Cost/Manufacturability Total

Weight: 5 2 3 10

Design 1 8 5 7 71

Design 2 5 6 4 49

Design 3 3 2 2 25

FIGURE 1 this figure shows the mathematical model that we used in our first decision.

As you can see from the table above this decision was an easy one, we chose to move
forward with concept for Design 1.

The start of this design involved the bulk spike bin, and ram currently used on the vehicle
as the starting point for this automation. Spikes would be pushed from the bulk bin to the top of
the slot and channel via the ram. The amount of spikes sent to the beginning of the process
would be controlled roughly by the surface area of the ram. Currently the ram pushes
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approximately 40 spikes per stroke out of the bulk bin, this amount will be used in the design.
From the bulk bin, the spikes will enter the first sorting operation.

The first portion of the sorting operation was tested using wooden prototypes to give the
group an idea of what might be changed or improved before construction of a steel prototype
began. Basic measures between plates and lengths of the process were determined and from here,
steel prototypes could be considered.

Moving forward to the next operation of the process, we understood that the output of
our first process would leave our spikes upright in one of four orientations. Working with this
information the group began conceptualizing and a design matrix was again formed to determine
a prototype to be constructed.

Designs considered for the second portion of the sorting process are described below.
Design one worked off of the concept of vibration and mass of the spike head. This concept turns
the spikes 90 degrees through the use of a twisted steel track that continues to vibrate from the
same source on the first portion. The spikes would travel down rails that would tilt them to one
side. While the spikes were lying on their side the larger portion of the mass, from the offset
head, should tend to point in the downward direction for all of the spikes. Spikes would remain
laying sideways for some calculated length to ensure the vibration allowed them to orient into the
proper direction. The spikes would then be twisted back to the upright position and in their final
orientation.

The second design and third design are very similar in nature as they both involve the
process being driven with a coil style drive. This coil will only allow one spike at a time to be
move between the spacing such that they will be individualized. In these designs the spikes are
oriented with the use of force, pushing the head that will orient all possible incoming orientations
to one final orientation.

For design 2, in particular, this force will come in the form of a split fork with two fingers
on it. These fingers will push the spikes and ensure that they are in the proper orientation. These
forks would be timed in correlation to the feed of the coil to allow the fork to push the spikes as
they pass.

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 For design 3 there will be a spinning wheel, or gear type device, with teeth that would
interact with the spikes, rotating them as the pass. Again this would be timed in correlation with
the coil to allow the rotation to happen at the proper time. This gear will serve the same function
that the fork will however it may give more forgiveness in the orientations coming into the
process.

All these designs will orient the spikes into their final orientation. Spikes will all be facing
one direction, determined by what spike gun it would be feeding.

Decision Matrix 2

Issue: Simplicity Speed Cost/Manufacturability Total

Weight: 5 2 3 10

Design 1 8 8 8 80

Design 2 6 6 5 57

Design 3 5 6 5 52

FIGURE 2 this figure shows the mathematical model that we used in our first decision.

From this matrix, it was easy to determine which of the designs to try first. The prototype
of design one is depicted in Figure 28. After study and testing of this design we found that it was
necessary to move on to our next best option Design 2.

Discussion of why design 1for the final orientation process did not work is described later
in the design evaluation section of this report. Spikes did not orient themselves via gravity and
vibration as the group thought they might. The second design for the final sort was then
constructed and test.

In review, the sorting process from starting to end, as a final solution, is described as
follows: Spikes start in a bulk bin, loaded in totally random orientation by a magnet. A ram inside
the bulk bin, then forces spikes up the side of the bin onto the first sorting process. At the first
sorting process, spikes encounter plates of steel positioned in valley type formations. The spikes
fall to the bottom of the valleys where the slot allows the bodies of the spike to fall through,
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catching the heads. From this process, spikes slide down these valleys, hanging by their heads,
onto the next process. The final process includes two operations that use a common drive device.
A coil begins to drive the spikes as they leave the first operation. Spikes encounter a stop on one
rail, which forces spikes that are facing that rail to be rotated. This allows spikes to be oriented in
three directions. From here, still being driven by the drive coil, spikes encounter the push rod,
which forces the spikes to rotate into the final orientation. After these processes are complete,
spikes are allowed to slide down a rail which feeds them to the spike gun.

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 V. DETAILS OF THE DESIGN CONTRIBUTION OF EACH
TEAM MEMBER

RICHIE FRYE

For this senior design project there was a lot of work to be done in a very short period of
time; much like any engineering industry problem. To accomplish this sort of task, there needs to
be high levels of communication and allocation of recourses so that we could ensure that success
was accomplished. While no one person took on these responsibilities, I fell that throughout the
course of the project this was something I did a lot of.

Upon receiving our problem statement, I contacted Steve Weber immediately to set up a
meeting with Nordco’s recourses. After a time was established our group sat down together to
just try to get some concepts to paper without the outside influence of anything Nordco would
say to us. It was the group’s perception that if we did this we would have completely new eyes
without any bias that Nordco may inadvertently give us. After we got some ideas of how we
thought would conceptually work, we ventured to Nordco and nail down the requirements.
Through this portion of the conceptual planning, everyone played a very important role and I
don’t know if we would have been as successful in our project had we not done this.

We meet with our sponsor, Nordco, before any other group had really discussed with one
another about meeting up with their project coordinators and I feel that due to our really fast
pace of work early in the project, set us up for all of the difficulties that would arise throughout
the rest of the process. From this meeting, we understood that this project was to be very
efficient, fast, as well as simple and we went back to the drawing board to evaluate our concepts.
Reading above, you understand how we arrived to the conclusions we did based on different ideas
and how well they meet the standards put in place by the company.

Moving from pure concepts to proof of concepts was the next step in the process and I was
the first one to come up with a disproof of concept. Right after the meeting that Friday, I went
home and mocked up a wooden prototype that can be seen in Figure 24. I built this prototype
because I had an understanding of how the spikes would proceed down a slanted surface and fall
in a channel; this was completely disproved through this prototype. The spikes did not respond
as I expected they would at all and actually acted much more like an oblique geometry that the
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spikes posses. It’s so important to be able to move forward in a design process and I feel that this
prototype allowed us to not only do this but do it quickly and this was the ideology I tried to
maintain throughout the project; keep moving forward.

Mean-while while I was working on this prototype, my two group members Tyler and
Mike were working hard on a prototype of their own; one that would prove to work. This concept
proof was what we used to move forward in our design process and maintain the pace that we
established the week before. Their prototype can be seen in Figure 25 and the final prototype
that came of it can be seen in Figure 26. Tyler and Mike also drove the production of the full
metal prototype through a lot of hard work in the machine shop and time in the experimentation
room assembling it. My contribution to this portion of the build came in minor PRO-E modeling
as well as some time in the shop in the early stages.

In the final stages of getting our initial prototype built, we started to move forward with
more conceptual designs of the later processes. I organized brainstorming sessions with the
group where we got together and organized some ideas we thought would work; the curved track
as well as the driven solution. Both of these ideas came out of the brainstorming sessions and the
work in the following weeks resulted in prototypes of both ideas. We had to prototype both ideas
because, as stated earlier, the first twisted track prototype failed to work as we hoped.

After we got together our ideas for the final sort, I set up another meeting with our
Nordco sponsor to discuss this. In this meeting we wanted to share our ideas with the person
who may have tried these things before so that we would not be repeating failure and further
increase our efficiency in this project; we always had to keep in mind the time factor of our
project. In this meeting, we also showed the sponsor the progress that we made up to that point
with our initial prototype. I feel that some of the best feedback happened in this meeting. We
got feedback that our concepts were very different that things that they had tried in the past and
that we were going through this project very well. The fact that our project was being look at in
this way really helped drive our group to continue to move forward and work at a high level of
quality.

The next thing I was heavily involved in was the manufacturing of the spring drive in our
final sort prototype. Conceptually this was a brilliant idea that Tyler came up with. He suggested

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that we take an axel, weld bolts as a spacing guide perpendicular on the axel. Then take a 6 foot
long ¼ inch welders steel rod and weld one end of the rod to the perpendicular to the end of the
axel shaft. We would then twist the long rod around the axel and tack it to each of the bolts
protruding from the side to ensure the spacing was correct. He started the process and built the
guide for the spring and that weekend a friend and I manufactured the rest of the spring and did
the welding. From here, I welded the coil to two plates and eventually welded the coil and plates
to a drive shaft that Mike and Tyler came up with.

Taking this component and getting a few more things including plywood, 2x4s as well as
some conduit, I spent the next few days doing the build of the final sorting prototype that can be
seen in Figure 30. This prototype was a very complex design as we needed to prove multiple
concepts on one design so it took a lot of fabrication and redesign to reach its final form. I think
being able to finish this helped us to move to the testing of all of our concepts and brought us one
step closer to wrapping up our project.

At this point it was time to start focusing on what was going to be evaluated for our
project; the website and final paper. Mike really took charge with the website design throughout
the whole course of the project I tried to focus a lot of my efforts in building the paper. The
literature aspect of the design is not as fun or really rewarding but it is something that needs to be
done and I’m happy to have been such a part of it.

All in all, I feel that this project required every bit of our time that was put into it and I
think that everyone’s contributions can be clearly seen in our high quality results. From concept
to full scaled design, every one of the team members really showed what they had worked so hard
on the past four years as our final results came together.

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 TYLER FOUKS

This portion of the report will describe the contributions I, Tyler, gave to the project. As the
problem statement was being defined with help of Steve Weber at Nordco, I was certain keep in
mind the ultimate goal of this project, as well as how we could develop it in a manner that
production of the system would require as little modification and alteration to the spike driving
tractor as possible. The problem, as stated above, required the group to develop methods of
orienting railroad spikes from bulk, to singular orientation. The method of dividing the process
into segments was agreed upon by the group.

When brainstorming ideas for sorting the spikes in the initial step, the idea of using the
head to orient the spikes in a vertical manner came to mind. I took it upon me to lead the
creation of a wooden prototype that would prove to the group that this method might work. A
grate was created with walls at angles; this forced the spikes to the slot and ultimately was
designed to allow the body of the spike to fall through while catching the heads. The wooden
prototype proved that the idea could potentially work well, and it was decided that a metal
concept be built.

For the metal concept, much of the machining required was completed in the shop. I
personally was responsible for a majority of this shop work. As the metal version of this channel
and slot idea was being build, I decided to attach a window fan motor to the chassis to allow some
vibration to the system, in hopes of helping the spikes vibrate into the slots, and to help them
slide down the slot. An off center weight was added to the motor to create vibration. This
worked well with the window fan motor until it burnt out. A larger motor with better bearings
was added with a similar, but larger offset weight.

The group noticed failure through the first process. Richie came up with the idea of
allowing the failure to occur, and to place the process over the top of the bin. This idea was great,
and I ran with it in my own direction. Working with existing components, I devised a way to use
the bulk spike bin and ram to eliminate failure from the first process. This included adding a
slide to the front of the bulk bin, allowing non-sorted spikes to recycle back to the bin, via the
slide below our first process. This allowed us to use the current bin, and avoided rearranging of
the position of the ram.

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 While working on the first portion of the sorting process, I kept thinking of ways in which
we might separate the spikes. The idea to separate the spikes was for the purpose of turning them
more easily in the next process. As the spikes were leaving the first sorting process they were
stacked tightly together, and turning them in this manner would be difficult.

Working on farms in my younger days, I witnessed many methods of moving items, such
as hay and feed. These methods played a large roll in the design of the next process. As I pictured
it, the spike might come off the first operation into a driving mechanism. This mechanism would
separate the spikes, allowing more room for rotation and orientation as well as allowing the
spikes to be processed horizontally. The idea of the spikes being processed on a horizontal came
into play when considering the offset head. If the head was to be rotated, interference from the
rail might be a problem if spike were to be turned while remaining on a sloped rail.

Methods of driving that I came up were a chain drive system, similar to that of a hay
elevator. This method would have large teeth grab the spikes as they came off the first process,
and drive them through the turning operation. With this rose the problem of separation of the
spikes before, or at, the entrance to the chain. If there were more than one spike per tooth of this
drive chain it would bind and not allow spikes to be turned easily. This idea was discarded for
that reason.

The idea of a conveyor also came to mind. I thought that it might be possible to have a
conveyor of sorts, where bars were passed under the spikes. These bars might come up from
underneath and grab spikes. The spacing of the bars might allow only one spike to enter, and still
allow it to be turned easily. This also was believed to be too complicated and was discarded.

My final idea for driving the spikes was to have a spring rotating, next to or under the rail,
and driving the spikes through the process. This idea became the idea that was investigated. It
allowed the spikes to be pulled without the worry of them being pulled in multiples. The action
of the rotating spring would grab spikes, and if more than one was in a single coil it would push
one or both out. Further down the spring drive, once spikes separated, a rail was added to the
side of the spring to stop spikes from being forced out sideways from the spring. The separation
of the coils on the spring was a large issue, finding the correct spacing was important. We needed
to allow one spike to easily turn, without allowing 2 spikes to fit into one coil. The distance that

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allowed this was 1.5 times the width of the spike. I would call this pitch, but pitch will change
with the thickness of the rod used to make the coil.

To develop a coil to test that this idea would work, I pulled some knowledge from welding
experience. I made a jig from a 3 inch diameter steel pipe, and some rod. The jig consisted of
segments of rod welded to the pipe in a measured distance that would allow a long rod to be
turned around the pipe and create the spring. The segments of rod allowed a guide for the long
rod to rest against and create correct spacing between coils. This spring would then be welded to
plates at each end of the spring, and to a shaft that would be used to mock up the process and
turn the spring, driving the spikes.

Concepts from my design notes and pictures of prototypes I built can be view in the appendix,
Figure 12 through Figure 16 FIGURE 11 Final head orientation conceptshow concepts, and Figure
25 through Figure 28show pictures of prototypes built with my lead.

Further processing of the spikes was left to the other members of the group. While I was
involved with conceptual input of these processes, prototyping and building of these processes
was limited.

Overall I would consider myself to be involved in almost every step of building the prototype
and absolutely involved in testing the processes we created. From concept to modeling, I helped
conceptualize, fabricate, test, and finalize ideas used in the final design.

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 MIKE SORENSEN

To begin our senior design project of aligning and sorting railroad spikes we split the design
into stages. The spikes would be positioned gradually from bulk to vertical with the correct head
orientation as to be fed into the loading tray. The concept of sorting was to take the bulk spikes
into a smaller amount then initial orientation and further step by step orientation until the spikes
are properly aligned so they are fed into the loading tray to be fastened to the railroad ties.

I started conceptualizing design ideas through sketches. I made several sketches of stages
of the design in the sorting of the spikes. My sketches may be seen in the appendix section of the
report as Figure 18 through Figure 23. The second design of the initial sorting was similar to what
Tyler and I made out of wood as seen in Figure 25. The design was a ramp-like, v-shaped
prototype to sort the spikes in a vertical position. We choose this design after completing a
decision matrix and improving on the first initial sorting prototype. Once completing the proof of
concept from the v-shaped ramp we continued improving on the design by making a metal
prototype in the UW-Milwaukee machine shop. The prototype proved that we could take an
amount of about thirty spikes of a random assortment into a row of vertically aligned spikes with
all of the heads at the top. The metal design can be seen in the appendix as Figure 26.

After we finished the fabrication of the initial sorting prototype we tried some slight
variations of the design. Some of the bulk loaded spikes were having troubles untangling so I
thought to add ridges to the sides of the v-slides. The ridges did not help much with the
untangling without further complication of the design. We then added a vibration source to the
prototype. The first motor attached to the system did not substantially shake the spikes down the
slide, and burnt out quickly. We machined an offset weight and attached it to the second, larger
motor we attached. The motor shook the spikes very well down the slides and after further
testing we found that the prototype proved a low failure rate, meaning that very few of the spikes
did not properly align vertically in the v-slide design. The failure rate could be reduced to zero via
the placement of the design. If the design is oriented over a catch bin for the spikes, the spikes
which are not properly aligned may fall back into the bulk and sorted later. This may be seen in
Figure 6. In the first prototype design I helped with the construction of the wooden pre-
prototype. I then helped with the further design of the metal system in our machine shop. The v-
slide prototype was designed to adjust to slight variances and account for testing changes to

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modify for the optimal design of the system. I was also involved with the variations and testing
on the initial sorting design.

The secondary design we tried first involved using the spike’s weight distribution. The
design involved two parallel rails for the spikes to enter after the v-slide design. The rails turned
from vertical to a horizontal position in hope that the spikes would slide down the rails and the
heads would all position downward and face the same direction. I helped with the fabrication of
this design in accordance with the machine shop. The prototype may be seen as Figure 26 in the
appendices. We met with some difficulties in this design when testing the concept. The
geometry of the spike, specifically the angled ridge under the spike head and the square design
were unforgiving in allowing the spike to rotate. This did not allow the head of the spike to orient
down. We then realized we would need a driving system to move the spikes from the first process
onto the next where we could further orient the spike heads.

The driving system to move the spikes from the v-slide was a spring-like or auger design.
The coils of the spring-driver designed catch the end of the spike and allow for one spike to fit per
spacing but also permitted enough room to rotate. The secondary process allows the spike heads
to ride along two parallel rails that are positioned above the spring-driver. To orient the spike
heads from four directions to three we designed a peg-catch on one of the rails that the spike
heads ride along. This allows the head to catch and rotate when it is being driven if it is
positioned to interfere with the peg. Finally to rotate the spike heads from three positions to one
we designed a fork-pusher which moves in correlation with the spring-driver, so when the driver
moves the spike past the pusher, the fork end moves past the spike head to rotate them in one
direction. After the completion of this process the spikes were all aligned vertically with the
heads a single correct direction. Under the spring driver we designed a plate to slightly raise the
spikes so the heads un-rested from the rails but kept them in a vertical position. I helped with the
spring driving design fabrication and the testing of this secondary process. The completed design
can be seen in the appendix as Figure 5and the prototype we built for proof of concept can be
seen in Figure 7.

While working on the different processes and designs of our system I was involved in the
creation of our group’s website. The website acted as a journal and a place to post our progress,
designs, prototypes and reports. This website allowed for peers as well as our sponsor to view our
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progress. The URL of the website is: http://spikegunload-sr-design.blogspot.com/. The website
allowed our group members to post and edit our progress in a blog-type fashion. I was involved
with the management of the address including the design and prototype postings among others.
The website included pictures, some of which can be seen in the appendices of this report and
videos of our tests and proof of concepts.

Some of the alternative designs during preliminary conceptualization are included in the
appendix. These sketches include designs that we did not continue further investigation or
prototyping. My sketches can be seen in Figure 18 through Figure 23. A concept design which
greatly differs from our final design was my version of the driving system to secondarily orient the
spikes. Once the spikes were in the vertical position the concept I designed would have been a
device to catch the spikes individually from the v-slide and allowed the spikes to fall down as the
heads were forced to orient in a single direction. The drive-chain would have had conical shaped
holes to catch the spikes. One reason we did not further pursue this design is because of the
specialized design would have been difficult to fabricate in the time allotted, or to adequately
design without prior testing.

Nordco requested that we design unique ideas for the spike alignment process, which I
believe we have succeeded in. We proved concepts and built working prototypes for each stage
which show the steps of our alignment. I believe that from our design process Nordco will be able
to utilize the concepts they see fit, or adjust our design to meet their own. They will be able to
utilize part or all of our design and concepts in junction with their product currently in use.

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 VI. DESIGN EVALUATION

As described in earlier sections of this report, the final design concept and prototype was
decided upon with decisions considering simplicity, cost, manufacturability and possibility of
prototyping by the group. The final design process is described below. Testing and evaluation of
the design will be discussed as will difficulties the group experienced while working on this design
project.

SORTING OPERATION 1: SPIKES HANG BY HEAD IN SLOT

To determine the layout of the final prototype, the group decided to make two different
wooden prototypes to test what we thought we needed to do in terms of the physical setup of the
process. The wooden prototypes we built can be seen in Figure 24 and Figure 25. From these
wooden concepts we moved forward and built our metal prototype. This prototype operated on
the basis of vibration and gravity to move the spikes through the slot and channel. We used a
small fan motor with an offset weight to shake the assembly at first but quickly found that this
did not produce enough vibration. Following this failure we moved to a 1/8th horsepower motor
with a more massive offset weight, which allowed for much more vibration in the apparatus.

During prototyping of this design, it was found that the spacing between elements of the
structure was critical. Spacing between plates, which created the slot, needed to be wide enough
to allow spikes to fall into place, yet not wide enough to allow the spike head to fall through. This
spacing was determined to work best at 1 inch. At this distance spikes would most easily fall into
the slot and heads not be permitted to pass. Another observation of the group during this
prototyping was that when the heads were caught in a certain orientation, sideway facing, they
were able to rotate about their head and fall from the slot. This problem was solved by placing
vertical plates beneath the slotted structure. These vertical plates also had a critical spacing
factor. The distance between these vertical plates needed to be wide enough as to not interrupt
the spikes as they were falling into the slot, yet be at a distance that would not allow the spikes to
fall through, via rotation about the head. These vertical plates also needed to be tall enough to
reach from the head to the bottom of the spike, plates were cut to 6 inches, allowing most of the
spike to be covered. The spacing between these plates, used for this portion of the structure, was

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found to work optimally at 5 inches. A figure of this critical spacing is illustrated on Figure 13 of
the appendix.

Failure in this portion of our design was found in spikes that did not sort by the end of the
process. The group took into consideration many methods of attempting to remove this failure
from the process. Preliminary methods included placing obstacles such as knobs and ribs on the
channel, in hopes of disrupting the spikes and forcing them into orientation. Prototypes included
placing bolts throughout the length of the slide, placing metal ribs down the slide and placing a
comb type object above the slide to catch spikes that were in knots, all attempting to force the
spikes to fall into the slot. These processes proved ineffective, and a final method was
experimented with. A final prototype of this process, which orients spikes from random order to
axially and hanging by head orientation can be viewed in Figure 26 of the appendix.

The final method of removing failure from the first process involved allowing the unsorted
spikes to continue down the slide, later to be rejected back to the bin of bulk spikes. This method
proved to eliminate failure from this portion of the process, orienting the spikes to hang from
their heads. Describing this method is somewhat difficult; a visual aid of the theory can be view
in Figure 6. As spikes that have not been oriented slide down the structure, they encounter a
section of rail that connects the first sorting operation with the second. Spikes that have been
sorted will follow these rails, still hanging by their heads, to the next process. Spikes that have
not fallen into the slot by this time are then subjected to fall off the sides of the rails and into the
slide which will direct them back to the bulk bin where they will be recycled.

Testing of this section of the system showed promising results. After running spikes
through the operation continuously, for a count of approximately 500 spikes, the failure was zero.
The addition of the rails where unsorted spikes can fall back to the main bin virtually eliminated
failure in the process. Testing was performed by taking a box of spikes given to us, around 30
spikes and dumping them on the start of the process. This was done to simulate the order in
which the spikes would be brought to the process via the ram. Spikes were dumped onto the
process, the box was placed at the bottom, and as spikes exited the process they were again
dumped onto the process to repeat the cycle.

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 DRIVE OPERATION: SPIKES ENTER DRIVE COIL

As the spikes leave the first operation, they continue to the second operation. This
operation requires that the spikes be separated and driven in order for the heads to be turned
properly. To accomplish this, the group devised a coil drive mechanism to drive the springs
through the process. The operation of the coil drive process is described below.

To start, the spikes enter the coil as they slide down the first operation where they hang
by their heads. The first operation if structured on a slope, which allows the spikes to slide with
help of vibration. This slope also serves as a way for the spikes to enter the coil and begin their
drive sequence through the sorting process. As the spikes near the end of the first process a coil
engages the body of the spikes. The coil spacing is critical here, if two spikes engage in the same
segment of the coil, binding will occur in later operations. This problem was solved by having the
space between coils be one and a half times the width of a spike. This allowed spikes to be
rejected as they entered the coil if more than one spike tried to enter a single segment of the coil.
If spikes are rejected and do not fill the coil, it is not considered a failure. The coil does not
always need to have a spike in every segment to meet the required feed rate. If only one quarter
of the spring is active, the feed rate will still be upheld due to the volume of spike coming off the
first sorting operation.

As the spring become engaged in the spring it is necessary to add a rail near the bottom of
the spike, so that, as it continues through the process, will not be rejected by the spring due to
friction forces wanting to push the body of the spring outwards. A rail that runs parallel with the
other rails which the spike rides on solves this problem easily.

Coil spacing is another important factor when considering the driving of the spikes. It
might be referred to as pitch in some instances, but we will not refer to it as pitch. The thickness
of the rod used to make the coil will affect the spacing between segments, if only considering
pitch the spacing would change with rod thickness. So for reference to the spacing in this paper
we will use the term segment distance. This will describe the distance of open area between
materials on the coil. Segment distance was considered in the introduction of spikes to the coil
for reasons described above. Segment spacing will also be a factor when rotating the spikes, as
they are driven, in the follow operations.

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 The final coil design allows spikes to enter the coil individually, if more than one spike
lands in the coil, the spacing between segments, the segment distance, will reject one or both
spikes. Once spikes are engaged in the coil they must also be allowed to rotate in later
operations. The segment distance of 1.5 times the spike width allows for this rotation. The coil
will begin at a point where the spike are nearing the end of the first process and continue to drive
the spikes until final orientation has been acquired.

Difficulties with the coil drive come from the section where spikes enter the coil. The
spikes enter the coil and must have room to be rejected, as described above. The period of time
these spikes should be allowed to be rejected from the coil is undetermined. Testing of this coil
was difficult due to the length of the spring the group was able to produce. The coil length tested
in this project was one foot long. If the coil had been longer more definitive test results might
have been concluded.

Testing of this segment of the process was performed in a mach prototype setup. The coil
was to be placed under the first sorting process to determine if spike would enter the coil as
expected. Due to the setup of the first operation, this was unable to be the method in which
testing occurred. Instead of placing the coil under the first sorting operation directly, conduit
tubing and flat stock plats were setup to simulate the first operations structural properties. The
conduit tubes were bent to allow a slope of the same degree for the spikes to slide down. The flat
plate, again, kept the spikes from rotating out of the rail. This testing method demonstrated that
the critical segment spacing indeed would reject spikes if more than one tried to enter a single
segment. Not all segments were filled, as the group had conceived might happen. Though this
did not raise concern as feed rates were still being met.

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 SORTING OPERATION 2: SPIKES ENCOUNTER STOP ON RAIL

In this operation the spikes are driven by the coil, through the final section orientation.
Two notable occurrences happen here first the spike encounters a sloped plate, which from the
bottom of the spike, pushes the head up slightly off the rail. This plate starts as a slope, to allow
the rise of the spike, and then planes out to become parallel with the rail. This riser plate allows
the spike to rotate more freely, as it will not be restricted by the rail. In this operation the spike
also encounters a stop on one of the rails. This stop is placed on the same side that the push rod
will be placed later in the process. The purpose of this stop is to force heads that are oriented in
this direction to rotate. The reason this rotation is necessary is to set the spike up for the next
process. After the spike leaves this section where it is rotated, it enters the final orientation
operation.

There were very few problems encountered in this stage; the main difficulty comes from
spikes jamming at the stop. If the head was oriented in a fashion that it pointed directly at the
stop it might possibly jam. This mode of failure was reduced by adding a spring type mechanism
to the stop. The mechanism would flex away from the rail as the head contacted it, allowing the
spike to rotate without binding. A concept is shown in the appendix, Figure 15.

This process, where the spike encounters the stop on the rail, serves as a simple solution
to having the spikes ready to enter the final process. The final process requires that spikes be in
any rotational direction except that in which the head faces the push rod.

Testing of this section required that the spikes be in the coil and driven through the stop
to determine its effectiveness. For the prototype of the stop, the group clamped a vise grip to the
rail. The vise grip would not allow spike heads in a certain orientation to pass. This stop did not
demonstrate the mode of failure the group expected might occur where the spike jams the
process. The group decided to still include the spring and flexure face to reduce the chances that
jamming might occur.

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 SORTING OPERATION 3: SPIKES ENCOUNTER PUSHER

In this portion of the design the spikes enter the final sorting operation. Here spikes
encounter a push rod device that reciprocates, in time with the coil, to orient all spikes to one
final orientation. Spikes come into the process in three orientations, some spikes may already be
in final orientation, but the remaining spikes will be rotated to match this final orientation. The
process is described below.

As the spikes enter the final process, still being driven by the coil and lifted slightly by the
riser plate, spikes encounter a fork shaped mechanism. This mechanism serves to eliminate the
remaining undesired orientations into one final orientation. The spikes again need to be slightly
elevated off the rail to allow the head to spin more freely in the rail; the riser plate used in the
previous orientation process accomplishes this. As the spikes are driven by the coil, this
reciprocating fork hits the heads of the spikes that are not in final orientation. The timing of the
motion allows the heads to be hit in a manner such that the body of the spike enters the space
between the two tines of the fork. As the fork moves forward it pushes the head and forces the
spike to rotate. Spikes in either the front or back facing orientations will be forced to rotate,
facing the head away from the fork. A figure depicting the action of the fork is shown in Figure 5.

Multiple forks would be desired in this section of the process to ensure that all spikes are
turned to final orientations. The timing of this element with the coil would be critical. As the
spike passes the fork, the fork would need to reciprocate to hit the spike as it is directly in front of
it. It was found in testing that the time it took to rotate the spike was a fraction of a second. As
the spikes are driven, and vibrated, the spikes rotate easily.

The spacing between the tines of the fork was found to have small effect on the
performance of the fork. Fork tine widths between 1inch and 2 inches were tested. While spacing
of smaller distances allowed for more complete rotation of the spike, it also required more
accurate placement, as to hit the spike properly. The fork with larger spacing allowed more free
motion of the spike within the tines, but did not always completely rotate the spike to its final
orientation, perpendicular to the rail. To solve this, as stated in the previous paragraph, the
group desires the use of multiple forks. The desired amount could vary, but three or four is
suggested by the group. The distance of tine separation in this multitude of forks might change
as they progress down the line. The beginning forks that encounter the spikes first might have
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wider tine spacing, allowing initial rotation of the spike. Following these initial forks would be
forks with tighter spacing, giving more complete and final rotation.

To complete this orientation operation spike would be driven into a section of rail that
would be closer together. This section of rail would not allow rotation of the spike before
entering the spike gun, ensuring the spikes remained in proper orientation. Included in this
process, the spikes would be driven off the riser plate, allowing the heads to again rest on the rail.
Upon exiting the coil drive, spikes would encounter a steep incline, down to the spike gun. Spikes
would be forced down the slide by gravity, and the process would be complete.

Testing of this final operation was the most difficult of all operations. As the coil was
hand driven, and the fork was also hand driven, correct timing was difficult to achieve.
Mechanisms for timing the coil and fork together could not be made. In implementation of this
device, however, the process might include hydraulic actuation of this motion. Timing of the
movement of the fork might be triggered, still mechanically, by the coil motion. Mechanisms to
connect this timing might me a cam on the coil interacting with a valve to operate fork motion, or
a completely mechanical linkage of the same sort. Testing concluded by the group showed that as
the spikes were vibrated and driven by the coil, rotating was easily achiever with two forks, one of
tine separation of 2 inches, then one with 1inch separation. Figures of this final sorting process
can be viewed in Figure 5.

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 SUMMARY OF FINAL DESIGN

To summarize the total design, spikes encounter multiple operations and exit the
processes in one orientation, allowing proper driving of the spikes by the spike gun. First, spikes
are pushed from the bulk bin, via a hydraulic ram, to the top of the slot and channel. Here spike
bodies are allowed to fall through the slot, while heads are not. Spikes that fail this process fall of
the rail at end of process, and recycle to bulk bin via a slide. Second, spikes engage in a coil,
which will drive them through the remaining processes. The coil allows only one spike per
segment, also allowing rotation by separating spikes. Next, as the spikes are being driven, the
spikes encounter a riser plate, lifting the head slightly off the rail, allowing easy rotation of the
head. Once spikes are slightly elevated, heads encounter a stop on one rail. This stop forces
spikes to rotate if in the undesired orientation at this point (depends on which side of the rail the
spike will be fed to). Once spikes are in one of three orientations (still driven by coil, and
elevated) spikes encounter an array of push forks. These forks push the heads, rotating them into
final orientation. Multiple forks are used here to ensure final orientation. Finally, spikes enter
narrower section of rail, which does not allow rotation. Here spikes also depart from riser plate
and coil, entering an inclined section of rail leading onto their final destination at the spiker gun.

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 VII. ECONOMIC ANALYSIS
Cost and manufacturing requirements were a large consideration in the development of the
final design. When possible the group opted to use existing materials or components to reduce
the need to manufacture new components. The group also considered the manner in which the
components might be manufactured and how they might be integrated onto the tractor.

Components of our system are similar to that of what is already used on the tractor and would
easily be produce by the same method as existing components. For instance, the slides that are
currently used to convey spikes from the cab to the spike gun are made of heavy gauge angle iron,
welded together and bolted to the feed for the gun. Similar materials might be used to produce
the parts required for our processes.

To manufacture the first process, simple flat stock iron, or angle iron could be used to
create the grate that catches the head. The addition of the slide to the bin to catch spikes that fail
the first process would be made of the same material that the bulk bin currently consists of. This
process also might include the need to rearrange the tractor to allow proper fitment of the design.
As discussed with Nordco, this was a minimal concern. Though rearranging the tractor would
take some consideration and time, once the tractor was setup for our new process, future tractors
to be setup with this automation process would be easily manufactured.

Manufacturing the later processes, which orient the spike to its final position, would take slightly
more time and manufacturing capabilities. The major manufacturing demand for this portion of
the design would be producing the spring used as the drive mechanism. This and the timing used
to connect the spring drive rate with the push rod reciprocation rate could take considerable
amounts of manufacturing time. The most simple solution to driving the spring and push
mechanism as discussed might be to drive them on constant velocity hydraulic motors. The use
of sensors and microcontrollers might also come into play at this junction in the process if so
desired. The chassis for this final sorting operation, again, could be produced using simple stock
steel type components.

Manipulation to the bin currently used for holding the bulk of spikes would need only
slight modification to accept this new process. As described above, slides would be added to
allow the failure of pins off the first sorting process to vibrate back to the bin. For the supply
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from the bin to the first process, the existing ram might be used. The stroke of the ram would
need to be able to push the spikes slightly further to enter them into the first process, but this
would be a simple manipulation or simple exchange of rams.

Overall the cost of manufacturing and applying this new design should make the design very
realistic to implement. Use of similar manufacturing methods would allow use of existing
manufacturing facilities to be used. When considering the tractor and the need to arrange the
vehicle, little concern is raised. Moving engine components and other devices on the car is little
concern to the functionality and efficiency of the machine.

VIII. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

We would like to acknowledge all of the effort that our help put into this project. From
the personnel in the machine shop, Dr. Balmer, and Steve Weber with Nordco; we could not
have been as successful as we were without their help. The ideas from all of our classmates
and other academic advisors were also extremely helpful in times where we found difficulties.

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 IX. APPENDIX

1. FINAL DESIGN

FIGURE 3 Compiled final design components

FIGURE 4 Initial sorting design. This design was used for the axial orientation process.

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FIGURE 5 Secondary sorting design. The spike heads ride on the rails which follow the first design.
The coil acts as a driving system. The pegs on the far rail turn the spike heads facing back and the
push-fork orients all of the spike heads in the forward position. The ramp at the bottom of the
design raise the spike heads off the rail to allow the heads to turn.

FIGURE 6 above is the slide which catches the spikes that fail to axially sort by the end of the initial
process. This slide feeds the spikes back into the bulk bin where they may be reintroduced to the
beginning of the sort process.
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FIGURE 7 to the left is a picture taken of our working prototype to test our design concept. This
concept may be duplicated to supply multiple spikers. The model was used for testing and proved
concept for each individual process. The throughput of this model was around forty spikes per
minute which
hich exceeds the requirement for feed rate. Through our design we intended to keep the
process as simple and mechanical as possible

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 2. CONCEPT DRAWINGS

FIGURE 8 Slotted drum axial alignment concept

FIGURE 9 Shown above is an initial concept fo

for axial alignment

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FIGURE 10 Magnetic drum axial alignment concept

FIGURE 11 Final head orientation concept

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FIGURE 12 (Slot and Channel, First Sorting operation
operation)

FIGURE 13 Description of wall placement to eliminate spike fall through failure

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FIGURE 14 Components for slot and channel concept

FIGURE 15 Description
on of rail stop, and modification
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FIGURE 16 Concept for driving spike through final operation initial concepts

FIGURE 17 Process to eliminate failure from first process

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FIGURE 18 Sorting process overall conceptualization initial sketches

FIGURE 19 Bin to first sorting operation, initial sketch thoughts

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FIGURE 20 Secondary sorting process, involving spring
spring-drive Initial thoughts

FIGURE 21 Peg catches to orient spike heads, initial concepts

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FIGURE 22 Chain-drive
drive to move spikes through secondary process. This design was not further
investigated

FIGURE 23 Secondary head orientation design. Concept was not further investigated
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 3. PROTOTYPES

FIGURE 24 First initial sorting prototype

FIGURE 25 Second initial sorting prototype

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FIGURE 26 V-slide initial prototype

FIGURE 27 Back view of initial v-slide prototype

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FIGURE 28 Parallel plate secondary orientation prototype

FIGURE 29 1/8 hp motor used to create vibration

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FIGURE 30 Proof of concept prototype of final sort

FIGURE 31 Spring drive system prototype used for secondary orientation of the spikes

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