Could you please help me understand this? Shown below are two images from the sketchup belt actuator build examples. What I can't understand is how the belt attaches to the plate. Looks like there is an 8mm low profile screw, belt clamp, T-nut, and aluminum spacer; however, I don't think that an aluminum spacer would fit into the channel here. Has anyone built this?
You are correct, the example doesn't work. It appears they were trying to trim down the one immediately to the left and didn't quite think it through.
@Rick 2.0 I wonder if I could get away with turning a custom spacer on the lathe... Still might be tricky to keep the T-nut from hitting the inside walls of the channel. The only solution I can think of at the moment would be to flip the direction of the bolt so that the bolt head is inside of the channel with a spacer.
The problem with all this is that when you wrap a GT2 belt around a 5mm bolt the thickness of the overall piece is roughly 7.2mm. The width of the V-rail slot is only 6.3mm. Truly to make this work, you would need to shave the teeth off the section of belt where it wraps and also grind down the sides of the bolt to about a 3mm width. This would bring your overall section down to where it won't rub the sides of the V-slot. As for inverting the bolt, that should be workable but you will still need to find a way to affix the bolt to the plate. There's not enough room for a nut on both sides of the plate to hold the screw in place. Best suggestion would be to drill and tap an additional hole in the plate and that way you would only need a single nut on the top side to lock it off.
@Rick 2.0 I like where you are going with this! Tapping the plate is an idea I hadn't thought of. I wonder if the bolt head/T-nut is even necessary, adhesive could be used to keep the belt from slipping downward. Perhaps shaving the bolt as you say, shaving the belt, tapping the plate, and then applying lock-tite and adhesive would work. @Jimmybuckets I'm not sure I understand your suggestion.
