Machine Control

Well, its finished! Took a while, but it has finally come to a conclusion. The marble sorter was easily one of the more challenging projects we have had inside of this class so far. No, bot because of the creative thinking and problem solving we have to use to choose what to do. It was the limited resources that we had that killed me on this one. Pneumatics was easily the biggest contributing factor to this project, but there was not enough tubing and solenoids for everyone. So some people were able to aquire 1 3solonoids, another 10, and that was about all the solenoids in the class. So without pneumatics, this project got a little harder. Motors don't act as fast as the pistons do, and presented a bit of a challenge. Eventually, I was forced to redesign the entire assembly to support only motors and the one pneumatics piston I could grab. So I worked as hard as I could for the last week, but only successfully completed a marble sorter that can sort metal and wood with only two marbles allowed to load at a time.

Brainstorming
I never was entirely good at this. Brainstorming is one of the aspects of projects that I simply skip. Why? You don't really know how something works until you really try it, and that time you spent working out the little kinks and details could or could not have been for nothing. In a sense, brainstorming feels like a gamble to me. The most I feel that really needs to be thought about is: your materials available, the problem that needs solving, and how much time you have. Often, the time aspect leads me to ditch every bit of brainstorming opportunity and quickly assembling what comes off the top of my head. Unfortunately, this same technique used for essay writing doesn't work the same as it does in building. I would have greatly befitted from some brainstorming, and would have probably been able to create a fully functioning project.
Design Modifications
The final design was eventually changed, not because of programming or time issues, but due to the limited supply of parts. The key to this project was the use of the pneumatics, which allowed for quick release of the marbles and pushed them into bins. Motors could push the marbles into bins, but not act effectively as gates. Unfortunately, the use of pneumatics was limited to a few people due to the amount of pneumatic parts we had. So, instead of having a track system that would stay underneath the pneumatic pistons, I decided to make a wheel like design. A gear would move in a circle and hit limit switches, and depending on the type of glass marble, it would stop when the assigned switch was hit. For example (and in less confusing terms), if the green marble is detected, it would be knocked into the bin and would continue around the circuit until the second switch was hit.

Final Design

Reflection
The group I was in did okay. We probably could have had a bit more cooperation, but that can't be helped right now. Overall, the "final solution" didn't work out as expected, and could only successfully sort the wood and metal marbles. The programming for the colored marble sorter didn't really get anywhere past the developmental and test stages, and had to be scraped. So, a couple of things I learned here: brainstorm after you grab all the parts you need, be VERY quick to adapt to the situation, and make heavy use of your partner.