Support the head independently

The first belt-pan concept kept the upper tilt mechanism and moved the pan drive out to the side. A servo on a tall gantry drove its own supported shaft, and a belt connected that shaft to the platform under the head.

Try packaging the speaker too

While I was in there, I tried to fit a speaker. The CAD reserved a front speaker holder between the shafts. The main frame came to about 120 by 70 mm, and the speaker ring and feet pushed the proposed footprint to about 120 by 84 mm. Battery, amplifier, and complete wiring weren't packaged yet.

Decide what to leave behind

I rejected it as overbuilt. The next brief walked away from the tall servo gantry, the separate drive shaft, and the large built-in speaker platform. One idea survived: a supported rotating platform, with the motor supplying only the torque.

Keep the detour in the notebook

These are direct CAD renderings, but of a packaging study, never a print release; the bearings, couplings, and fasteners still had unfinished details. It stays in the journal because the lower, smaller base in the next chapter makes more sense once you've seen what it replaced.