Last week I made a new aluminum dome drive mech to replace the Daren Murrer’s HDPE version I’d been using. There wasn’t much wrong with the one I had to start with, but I gotten it in my head I wanted to try making one myself from aluminum to go with my new dome motor.

The one I created is a combination of Daren’s and the original Atomic Pickle design design. Here’s a photo of my original HDPE mechanism on my aluminum frame.

I used some 1/4″ scrap aluminum that already had a few holes in it, so I had to work around them using the original bracket as the template.

I don’t have a mill at home so everything would have to be either cut on the band saw, Dremeled, drilled or worked by hand tools like a file.

I rough cut the piece on the band saw and drilled the initial holes

The long hole in the center was greater from three smaller holes I’d drilled and filed away to create one big hole.

One issue I knew I would have was making the center hole/cut-out large enough to accommodate the approximate 1″ wide lip/step on on the motor. Also note how the drive shaft is off center due to the gear box.

At first I thought I could file away enough material but it would be slow going. I could also have bought a $40 1″ drill bit but I had another idea. My Dremel has a router attachment that could create a lip on the long slot that I’d created.

I forgot to take photos of the next few steps, but the rest of the mechanism that bolts to the frame is pretty simple, and just two blocks with a few holes in them. I made the main support piece a litte wider than on the Atomic Pickle design as I wanted to add extra support to the main bracket that holds the motor.

Here it is installed in the frame. Note, in some of these photos the motor is flipped the wrong way and the shaft should be toward the center of the frame.

At the pivot point I drilled and installed a bearing like the original Atomic Pickle design, but on hindsight I probably could have just stuck with Daren’s idea of just having a regular hole with a bolt through it.

Here’s the motor position correctly in the bracket

Overall I’m happy with how it came out and given a template and basic tools anyone could make one at home.

Here’s a short video of the new mechanism in action