Are the wheels to move it along a rail and if so does it perform its function in both directions or does it do its thing one way and then return and start over? If its attached to anything are their hoses or some conduit to supply it with a material to extrude? Now I'm thinking 3D printer but I don't know exactly how they work.
The wheels are not for moving it. It performs its function in both directions. No material is fed to it. Nothing to do with a 3D printer.
So the wheels are for contacting another object that slides or rolls beneath it. Is is some kind of fabricator? Maybe to bend metal into shapes?
This coming down to why all of those belt drives and pulleys? What do they do? The objects they drive are not obvious. Belt drives are used for three reasons--they are cheap, they are flexible, and they dampen vibrations, any of which could be at play here. There is no scale to this object to estimate how big the motor is but it has some amperage by its size and heavy power cables. So what do we have now . . . Belt 1 - from the main electric motor pully A to pulley B. Pulley B drives a rotary device in a housing with signal wires attached and possibly also a hidden shaft to pulley C. Belt 2 - from pulley C to pulley D. Pulley D is on the end of a shaft that next contains pulley E and then another housed and wired rotary device. A hidden shaft may also drive pulley G on the other side of the device. Belt 3 - from pulley E to pulley F. It is difficult to see what Pully F is attached to but it may be related to the small belt we see underneath . . . Belt 4 - from near pulley F to the inner axle. This may be unrelated to the other belts or not but it drives that axle or is driven by it. Belt 5 - from pulley G to pulley H. Pully G is attached to another wire, housed rotary device that may be driven by a hidden shaft from from pulley D. Pulley H is attached to pulley I on whatever rotary device is inside that plastic housing that is attached to the outer axel. Moving parts include 2 axels, 9 visible pulleys, perhaps 3 hidden pulleys, 2 feeler actuators, perhaps two hidden shafts, and 5 drive belts. There are also a major plastic housing attached to the outer axel with a right-angle component and a drum-shaped component. There are 3, possibly 4 metal housings of wired rotary devices attached to pulleys. The feelers actuate the mystery device in the plastic housing that also has a belt drive on it. I have no idea what all of those pulleys and belts are for. It all seems pretty 20th century but it does have a circuit board so there is logic of some sort involved in what it does. It is designed to act or react to input from control cables and its own sensor. Those feelers make the outer axle rotate and control the mystery device. Maybe some kind of valve actuator that adjusts it depending on the force from that feeler gauge sensor. The inner axle is driven by a belt, so perhaps it drives the other end of that mystery device. But why the big motor and all of the drive belts? What is inside that plastic housing? What is inside the metal rotary housings? Motors, controllers, bearings, clutches, brakes, what? It is apparently all about driving and controlling the mystery device in that white plastic housing. If its not a pump, then it doesn't control move air or liquid. What does it do?
Unless its a garage door opener. KyleK said he would take some more pictures, meaning that he probably has one of these things at home or at work so its not just a random object from the internet.,
