White River High School, located at the foot of Mount Rainer in Buckley, Washington, was challenged with a real-life situation recently.
The school district's middle school could no longer raise and lower the gym's basketball hoops. The mechanism was 50 years old and the broken piece was obsolete. To get the unit functioning again, the district would have to totally retrofit the whole lift motor and switch, at a $2000 cost.
So the maintenance department came to the CAD class instructor, Bob Brooks, to ask if CAD and the 3D printer could help.
Brooks took advantage of the training situation and sophomore Dillon Hadaway reverse engineered the mechanism, using Rhino to draw up a new mechanism. The new piece was printed in 3D and installed with a new metal guide created in the metals class.
Once again, the hoops can be raised and lowered.
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