Also we have been working on a way to connect the pieces of the device together. The device will be three seperet pieces that will be connected with a new thing i have designed. Not sure wht to call it yet.
Today we started working intensly on our websites.
I learned how to insert an image into the source code of my website. I am concerned with the amount
of time it will take to do journal entries
now that it is a website i still think that the regular notebooks like last year woud be much easier
on us as students, However; I do realize how much easier this will be on Dr.Neat
The last few days weve been working on our spaghitti bridge Wednesday Challenge.
My group has gone with a fairly simple design that I believe is the most disperstion efficient .
today we got our bridge from Dr.Neat and it turned out to be brittle. Consequently we changed
our design to a straight rod of pasta and glue. Today we also found some old computers outside and
we took the power supplies from them to use and we put the cases back together and returned the old computers.
Today I tested our bridge and it held up the water jug with some water in it.
I was happily surprised that it did so well and scored a overall score of 4. Also I built another bridge today to compete with tomarrow.
Over the long weekend I read the official rules for the JPL Invention Challenge.
What I'm thinking as of now is that we should create a device that will get the billiard ball to move as fast as possible
and measure that time and make the noise device compensate for that anount of time and trigger a sound exactly 20
seconds after firing.
Today we had a wednesday challenge(wedchall form can be found at the top under Wednesday Challenge Forms).
Todays challenge was to roll a marball from the starting point to the end using halfpipes and humans. Here are some Pictures from todays event.
Today we talked about JPL Invention Challenge and I presented my JPL Invention Challenge 2014 powerpoint.
Mr.Wilton from Mechanical Concepts was also here to help us out. I ended up talking the whole period instead of alowing time for others, however;
it did end up being a meaningful discusion. We even judged an idea by Nico to see if it was a legal device.
Today we worked on JPL. we decided to brake up into two groups. Group one focusing on cat.1 and the second on cat.3.
Today we continued on JPL. Group 1 made a semi slingshot device that needs improvement.
Today we listened to Abbey talk about her story the path she took and where she is now.
she talked to us about how we are killing ourselves due to rising co2 levels.
Today we made the track wider improving our stability as the ball rolls down the track.
Today in Dr. Neats class the JPL group which i am a part of presented our concept device that was our answer to the challenge given by Dr.Neat.
Mr. Wilton pleasured us with his pressence and was able to stay and constructivly critisize our device. One thing we talked about was how our device would be affected by the slope of the
ground at JPL and at the qualifier. As we already know from last year the concrete area where the comp. is held at JPL is of level by 1 or 2 degrees.
Today we started working on the wilton test. This test was designed to find the affect skope has on the spee of the ball roling down the track.
Today we helped get everyone in the JPL get FTPed.
Today we skipped the wednesday challenge and worked on JPL invention and started working on CADing our Idea.
On Friday we presented our CAD and then talked to Mr. Wilton about how we pretty much didnt get anything done.
Today we worked on A schedule for who will be working on what for the Jpl Invention chall.
I will be posting the schedule here soon.
Today we started working on the Wednesday challenge for the end of the quarter.
The challenge is to build an arch bridge with the biggest normalized score of everyone.
today we started our CAD and finished but we now have to fabricate it.
Here is our Sketchup!!!!!!!!
All we did today was listen to Dr. Neat talk about our websites because practically no one did anything which was upsetting to Dr.neat.
Because JPL couldnt meet today due to lack of effort on our websites I started working on the CAD for JPL. I was able to do this because I understand how to do my notebook I just forget to do it,
so i didnt need to take part in the practice upload. Here is where I am with the CAD as of today. These bars are exactly 1 meter long, also I figured out that one mark in the rotate tool is 15 degrees.
Today I worked further on the CAD of the JPL invnt. Challenge and we now have a basic design for the frame and track.
Also we have been working on a way to connect the pieces of the device together. The device will be three seperet pieces that will be connected with a new thing i have designed. Not sure wht to call it yet.
Today I worked on the CAD a little more. we tried to start prototyping but were shut down by DR. Neat because he was busy.
Also there are new restrictions being put on us that were supposedly in place before but nobody i our group was aware of them, this is getting to be extremly aggrivating.
I almost feel that im stuck between a rock and a hard place because we were told to prototype as the CAD was getting done not after the CAD was done. However this may
be a miss understanding which I hope it is.
Today we presented our stuff to Mr.Wilton and he told us we basically didnt get anything done and that we need to start doing some stuff like finish CAD and have a prototype.
I WASNT HERE TODAY
Today I Worked on sketchup again. I completed the design for the spring launch mechanism for the very begining part of the device. This device uses a spring conected to a piece of 1"x1" 6061 Aluminium
that has a bolt runing through it so it wont slip off. Now I got to design a launch portion/ trigger to set it off.
Today we worked on our prototype for the Spring and the first launch didnt work well and the device broke. I started working on riping apart our old prototype
from week one and put away the material used.
Today I continued to do CAD but then the Belts crew didnt get me the stuff I need to complete the CAD so I watched Mythusters and Worked on my website.
Today we presented to the class our progress for the week. It wasnt very exciting and there were no question. Kyle finished or is close to finishing the code for the arduino and we have tested the arduino on a small motor IT WORKS!!
Today I worked on the CAD a little more and helped James and Ian with the proof of concept for the spring. We are now using a solder sucker as a launch mechanism.
Today I continued to work on the CAD for the belts since we still dont have a final idea for what that is goona look like , unfortunatly i didnt really get that far on it.
Today like yesterday I worked on the CAD for the belts. It seems that everytime I start CADing it I find out that for somereason it wont work and have to create a new design.
Today we prepared for presentations tomorrow because Dr.neat wouldnt et me talk because I talk every week.
Today we presented our progress to the class... it was ok but there were things I wish Icouldve said but couldnt because I was not aloud to talk.
Today I worked on the CAD and figured out what we need to do for the side wall of the belts section. My idea is that we take a 2x4 and cut a groove out that is going to hold the wood onto he post office metal.
Absent
Absent
So from this point we had started to fabricate the pieces of our device. We made four, two meyer long pieces that made up the springs portion of the track and the part of the track that was designated for gravity.
The original plan for the track was to weld the bars together so that they would be held together perfectly. While test welding the pieces we found out that it is extremly difficult to get a good weld on that shepe of the metal so we decided to use bolts to
we set it up and the belts werent working the way they were supposed to, also when we were called for staging we ended up braking the switch that sets off the sound. Another problem we faced with was that we werent preppared for the high stress of the event
and ended up rushing setup to the point that the track was setup incorrectly and made the ball fall off three times. The upside was that Paul liked the idea of our device and wanted to see it work.
Today Dr. Neat told us that we needed to get our notebooks up to date for the last few weeks. Also he told us that we need to get our invetion together and try to make it work so that we could show the class. Today though I spent about half the class
working on my notebook so that I wouldn't drop my grade.
Today I focused on making sure or trying to make sure the track was stable and the bolts were properly tightened.
Today I worked on lining up the metal for the invention correctly and tried to get the belts to work.
Today we conntinued to work on the invention and powerpoint for the presentation tomorrow.
Today we went to JPL for the invention challenge. Once we got there Gaby and friends set up and then we walked around and "scouted other teams" as if it were Robotics. Once the team competed they got the ball all the way with no malfunctions with a time of 20.106
seconds and a score of .106 which would earn them second place.
Today we the JPL croud presented to the class about the JPL invention Challenge. We talked about the winning device and our device.
Today we learned what our final was for Dr.neats . we have to design a suspension bridge, CAD it, Powerpoint it, then send it to fifth period and get one from fifth period and then build it, then finally compete.
These days we worked on CADign our Bridge and makeing a good Powerpoint so that the bridge we give is clear enough to build.
Here are some pictures.
Today we received the Power point from the other group five and I dont really like the design and dont think it will work so right now I'm banking on our design.
So we decided to make a miniature model first to test the Idea. I didnt take any pictures but it didnt work at all, in fact it totally caved in on itself because the outside supports had nothing holding them
back so they just cave in because of gravity. It cant even hold itself up so I have no faith in it working to hold a billiard ball.
Today we built our full bridge and I must say its a piece of crap. We decided to add bottles of water at each end to help hold it up we think this will work but I still have little fath that it will.
Today was the final for fourth period and our bridge got disqualified because it couldn't hold up the ball at all. We ended up adding two more bottles of water to each side to help hold it up but that didnt help enough.