This week I was able to finish testing the final PCBs. We ran into issues during testing so I replaced the multicore wire on 5 of the PCBs with single core wire. I also mounted the speaker and button modules into the encasing. We have made good progress and are on track to finish the system. I also helped Mukundh to design the new amplification circuit for the speakers.
Juan Mejia’s Status Report for 4/22
This week, was mostly focused on hardware. I took the time to redesign and laser cut the top of the board so that it was one piece with slots to glue in the braille tiles. I also engraved the corresponding letters around the border of the board to improve accessibility. Since the PCB arrived this week, I spent a good 12 hours soldering components to the PCBs using solder paste and using manual solder. On the second day of solder, me and Edison started to test 3 of the PCBs that we completed. We had a few bugs. There is still some work to complete as I will be mounting our internal components and soldering more PCBs, come Sunday and Monday.
Juan Mejia’s Status Report for 4/8/23
This week I focused on designing the holders for all our components in side our board. I also designed the power circuit necessary to power the entire hardware system. On the side I also engrave the top of our case with slots to put the braille tiles as well as engrave the letters next to them. In terms of schedule, I am waiting on the PCB and other hardware components to finish up the board.
Juan Mejia’s Status Report for 4/01
This week I was able to finish the Arduino code to take in the signal from all the PCB muxs and then cycle through all the different sensors using the select lines. I also set in the cases that whenever a signal on a specific tile changed it would use the Serial communication library to send a string with the corresponding chess coordinate. The other thing that I focused on was building and designing the actual physical board using laser cut and engraved plywood. I would say that I am on schedule with the encasing of the system, but had some delays with the Arduino Code. I tried to insert a picture of the encasing, but the size is too big.
Juan Mejia’s status Report for 3/25/23
This week the task that I was assigned to work on was getting the communication between the Arduino and the Raspberry Pi up and running. I was able to accomplish this using serial communication on the Arduino and using the the pySerial module on the Raspberry Pi. I was able to achieve a sub 2 second communication between the devices from start up. I am back on schedule with my work and currently waiting for the PCB to arrive in order to communicate the PCB with the other systems. This week I hope to communicate the Raspberry Pi with our Web-App.
Juan Mejia’s Status Report for 3/18
This week I focused on designing and fabricated our PCB. I used an online PCB designing tool called easyeda.com. It allowed me to set up all the components for needed for a row of the board. This week I also worked on a ethics assignment that was due this week. The last thing I worked on was the setting up the Raspberry Pi OS, so that it can be ready for our Web-App communication. In terms of of keeping up with schedule, I am a bit behind in terms of the hardware design, however a lot of work was able to get done and we should be back on track by Monday. By Wednesday, the logic to control the logic on the muxs will be completed on the Arduino. I will also by Friday have the board laser cut and engraved the braille.
Juan Mejia’s Status Report for 2/25/23
This week was mostly focused on the fabrication of the physical board tiles and pieces. I started designing the pieces from scratch, however Mukundh found existing 3D models and took over the work on Rhino. I designed a test board that has a 2×2 tile design to represent the black and white tiles( see attached picture). There was delay in the arrival of the hall effect sensors because we had to order new ones, so the unit testing that I wanted to do this week, didn’t get done. I have begun setting up the circuit for the PCB, need to call AutoDesk to ask for the correct library for the hall effect sensor.
This coming week I hope to finish 3D printing all the pieces for the board that we need for testing and finalizing the dimensions and design for the tiles and chess pieces. Once the hall effect sensors arrive, I plan on working with Mukundh to do the unit testing and finish designing the row PCB, in order to send it for fabrication. I also hope to get the micro SD for the Raspberry Pi, in order to set up the OS and connect it to our WebApp.
Juan Mejia’s Status Report for 2/18/23
This week was focused on designing the test circuit in order to figure out the output for the hall effect sensors. The other categories that I focused on were researching the proper components from Raspberry and designing the chess pieces in CAD. In order to achieve the connectivity, I requested the Compute IO board from ECE resources, but I have found it difficult to find an available Compute 4 Board. I might need to pivot to using a Raspberry 4 Board. For the CAD, I managed to design the rook and pawn pieces manually, but after the suggestion of Mukundh I am going to use 3D models for piece found online. After meeting with Will and Professor Gary, our team updated our schedule for the nest two weeks, so we our on schedule. This coming week, I hope to work with Mukundh to get a understanding of the hall effect sensors and start using AutoDesk for the PCB.
Juan Mejia’s Status Report for 2/11/23
For today’s progress report there was mostly planning and learning done this week. Since one of our biggest obstacles in designing our board is creating the PCB, we have a to learn how to use Eagle/AutoDesk. Me and Mukundh are in charge of designing the PCB so we both have to be able to make proper decisions when using the required software. My main goal after Wednesday’s presentation was finding and watching tutorials online, some of which I will link in this post. The goal for the next status report is to have a primitive PCB design that could serve the purpose of our project. I would say that on my end, I am a bit behind schedule. In order to get back on schedule, I plan on getting as much hands on experience I can this week with the Eagle at the computers in ANSYS. I am also beginning to research how I am going to design the engraving on chess pieces so that they can distinguishable.
Some Examples of the Youtube videos that I watched: