Category: Andrew’s Status Reports

This week, I primarily worked on the Design Report. Since I am in charge of all of the physics and hand calculations, I put most of my focus on the Design Requirements and Design Trade Studies. The Design Requirements was fairly straightforward in terms of outlining the formulas and calculations I did for the exit speed, RPM, kinetic energy, torque, and power. I also described how the weight of the launcher will be supported, the necessary depth perception and processing speed of our camera, the necessary electronic components of a microcontroller to process CV and perform my projectile motion calculations, and the need for a big motor like a bike motor. The Design Trade Studies on the other hand was more challenging than expected, which is where I spent most of my time. Since this section called for explaining the other approaches our team thought of implementing but abandoned, I walked through all the logic and reasoning behind the physics calculations and how to balance between all considered fields to ensure the DC motors controlling the spinning wheels are not overstressed in one area over the other. I talked about our final decisions for specific wheel size, exit speed, energy, RPM, torque, power, microcontroller, camera/CV, launching mechanism, and DC motors. I also helped John and Miles write and proofread the other sections of the Design Report. The design report is under the “Design Review” menu of the website.

My progress is on schedule. Since all of the design requirements and the design trade studies are now clear, my main focus is to assist John and Miles with working on the CV and motor control to physically see if my math is correct.

Following fall break, I hope to start building the launching mechanism. I want to first attach the wheels to the DC motors and have them spinning to ensure it is stabilized and see if it can actually shoot a tennis ball around 20+ feet. Once that is completed, I will help work on the CV with Miles and John to start tracking a target and controlling the motor control board that helps rotate the base and spins the wheels.

There were a few components accomplished this week on the project. For the first half of the week, John, Miles, and I spent time reviewing the design presentation slides. Due to the extensive amount of content to be presented, going over them together helped John prepare exactly what to say on Wednesday given the time limit. For the second half of the week, I started working on the Design Report. I have been working on the Introduction, Use Case Requirements, some Architecture, and mostly Design Requirements. From the calculations I derived last week for the design presentation, these sections seemed the most feasible to work on first. Since I am in charge of deriving the physics of the system, I have started working on the Design Trade Studies to analyze the trade-offs and constraints of Passing Partner primarily through equations right now.

My progress right now is on schedule, so there are no changes at the moment.

Next week, I will be working with my group to finalize the Design Report. Since the Design Report will involve a lot of calculations to complete certain sections, this is where most of my focus will be. I also hope that with the Design Report coming together, I can potentially add new certain motors, wheels, etc. to the finalized Bill of Materials.

 

This week, I helped John and Miles in completing the Design Review Presentation. Since John is chosen to present, I also went through all the slides to ensure they were of high quality, concise, and included helpful images/diagrams to allow the audience to interpret more thoroughly. I also completed final calculations on ball exit speed, RPM, ball exit energy, torque, and power to determine what major motor we need to spin the wheels to launch the tennis ball 20+ feet at 45º.  I have attached a pdf file of my math below to demonstrate my progress.

Design Presentation Calculations

Alongside assisting Miles and John to identify the specific motor we need to spin the wheels sufficiently, I also helped fill out the form to borrow a Raspberry Pi, motor board, and Oak-D Pro camera.

I feel like our progress is on schedule, and we may be a little ahead due to changes in our structural design. Instead of a titling mechanism to shoot the ball at different vertical angles, which correlates into our stretch goal of launching different shot types, we are going to keep the launcher static at 45º. This ensures that my calculations will maintain consistency and the tennis ball will truly reach the 20+ feet mark.

Next week, I hope to help complete the BOM since we have already acquired most of our major components through the ECE department. I also hope to help John and Miles get started on the CV and maybe motor control.

This week, I worked on the proposal presentation slides along with Miles and John.  I helped work on the content in Use Case, Use-Case Requirements, Technical Challenges, Solution Approach, Testing, Tasks and Division of Labor, and Stretch Goals. I also drew the block diagrams and blueprint of the overall launcher mechanism/structure for the class and staff to interpret. Since I was chosen to present, I added images and made slide texts concise for better quality, appearance, and readability. The slides are posted under the “Proposal” menu. After the proposal presentation, I did some initial calculations on a Wilson US Open tennis ball and the amount of energy, force, power, and exit speed needed for our desired launch distance of 20+ feet. This will help us determine the wheel size, RPM, and motor power needed later on.

My progress, as well as my team’s, is on schedule and everything is moving smoothly at the moment. Everyone is doing their part to ensure we accomplish each major step on time.

Next week, I hope to work on the Bill of Materials for all the components that we need for Passing Partner. I also will assist in completing the design presentation and hopefully accomplish more calculations on our physical constraints.