Egg drop challenge Iteration #1

2) Total # of achievments: 23
 3)

 4)

our totall weight was 24 gram with out the egg and could also fit inside of a cigar box so we earned 3 more points there.
 We earned 3 achievments for hitting the 2nd ring of the target.
Our egg cracked but remained in good form only minor damage no massive breaking so we earned 3 points
We used geometrey and algebra/physics to calculate projections for our project as shown in the pictures earning 2 more points we also earned 3 points for sketchs and 2 points for material planning.



5)Designs with paracutes were very affective and mostly got the egg securly but i did like our design and thought it yielded good results except for the egg cracked because I threw our apparatus at the target instead of dropping it (I was going for speed). I think we could have tried to make our design smaller and more padded. We could have also worked on our launching to make the porduct more accurate

Glider challenge

1.

Final Glider



2. Design Phase

1) The challenge is to create a glider using balsa wood and tissue paper. We have to make a glider that will hopefully glide the longest for the greatest amount of distance and most hangtime, if not both then it should do one of those things.

2) There are no rules to brainstorming. We went through all possible ideas and considered what would be the best approach to create the best design. We took ideas from the gliders around the class and we went online to look up ways in which the most efficient gliders are built, we then took these ideas to help create our own. Our idea was to create a glider with a short glider with long wings, angled up at 15 degrees and curved at the tips to reduce turbulance, then put two horizontal fins as well as one vertical fin. We ended not being able to to curve the wings because the wood would bend enough, also we ended up not being able to angle thie wings also, so we had to just put them flat, and we couldn't put a vertical wing because of lack of material.

3) Criteria: We had to use the material, the blasa wood and tissue paper, nothing else, and had to use glue and tape to stick things together, nothing else.

Constraints: The criteria really limited our creativity because we couldn't just use any material we wanted which limited what we could do.

4)

3. Test Phase

+ 1.       Solid flight 2.       Ok distance 3.       Good wing hole	Outcomes to change 1.       Try to lengthen flight time 2.       Try to lengthen flight distance 3.       Try to decrease the size of the plane
? 1.       Short flight time 2.       Lack of controllable direction	Ideas 1.       Increase stability of the plane 2.       Decrease the size of the plane’s wings 3.       Increase amount of tissue paper

Our main goals for our glider our to increase the distance it can go and I think decreasing the wing size and using more tissue paper and trying to add stability to the wings are our main goals.

4. Performance and Improvements

Our glider did not perform very well at all, it dropped immediately and went backwards. I i think a lot of it had to do with the wings, the wings needed to be much shorter because they were to heavy and caught too much wind, the shape of the wings need to be changed because they weren't efficient, and lastly the wings were not supported right they were to flmsy. Also we needed to put on a vertical fin, that would have helped a lot.

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.

more pictures

Project pictures

ROBO Subprograms counter

We created a sub program that counted to 5. Then we made the main program with the counter so you could see the count but you only see the >5 symbol representing the counter program.

This is beneficail because it is a good way to organize and not have a giant program desplayed the whole time. This is especailly useful for those who are messy programers.

3.1.7

Construct and program a vehicle to be able to move forwards and backwards upon different time intervals.

Team Members: Austin Von Pohle, Austin Copp, Will Burroughs

Austin VP programmed the RoboPro software do the needed specifications of the assignment.

We all worked on construction of the vehicle from brainstorming the design of the vehicle, to implementing this design with the building materials and the wiring of the vehicle.

Will prepared the images for this blog post.

We ended up choosing to wire it parallel as opposed to in series. Since we wired it parallel, both motors see the same voltage, giving them equal strength.



Austin Von Pohle was the MVP his programming and construction skills were very valuable to completing the project.

The main problem was the construction of a vehicle that could go forwards and backwards but also does not go too far over the limit of the distance to be traveled. To complete this task we hardwired stop buttons that when the vehicle was moving back the back switch would be the first thing to hit the limit and therefore click the switch stopping the vehicle from moving in that direction.

Conclusion

1. What was the most difficult part of the problem?

2. List and describe two features that were not part of the design problem that could be added to improve your design.

1.       I think the most difficult part was wiring and programming the vehicle so that it could move easily and not get caught up in the wiring. We used the Bluetooth functions of the computer and Robo TX Controller to connect the programming to the controller wirelessly.

2.       The vehicle could use more energy from more motors or a battery pack; we had a little problem getting the vehicle to get to faster speeds this could be fixed with the addition of more energy sources. Also I think that we could have organized the layout of the vehicle a little better due to the fact that the wires are quite scrambled in various parts of the vehicle doing so would increase its visual appeal and prevent wires from breaking or getting disconnected/lost in the jumble.