This week our team has been focused on parts setup and finalizing design plans, and preparing for our design review presentation.

Arka has finalized the CV algorithm for object detection. He has been testing with images of breadboards and using those to tune the object detection algorithm. He has also been having some trouble setting up the RasPi on the CMU wifi, but will continue to look into it this weekend.

Claire has been researching on the theory and power ratings of different brands of stepper motors. She has put in the order for the Nema17 with the appropriate motor driver and will begin preliminary testing next week. She has also decided on using the rack and pin 3D-printed part with a servo as our Z-axis extension arm. The design for our robotics XYZ system has now been finalized.

Maxine has been working on the XY gantry. Whilst waiting for the rails to arrive, she has been identifying what 3D printed components we would need to mount the timing belt and stepper motors to the gantry. The parts have been printed and she should be ready to start assembling by the time the rails come start of next week.

In the following week, Arka aims to start flushing out the CV pipeline from the image capture side, and start working on the colour classification portion of the algorithm. Claire aims to set up the stepper motors with the driver and be able to control it with at least an Arduino, ideally the RasPi. Maxine aims to have set up the completed XY gantry.