Final Post

Our Presentation

Today, we presented our project in Cumnock Hall. Although our project failed to meet our requirements, we still had a great time working on it. Everyone seemed to be understanding of our bubble machine and how it should have operated.

After experiencing the design process for our project, we figured out a few things that we could have improved on regarding the specifications for the apparatus. We stumbled across time constraints and time management, as gluing the fan required at least 30 minutes to apply and dry, which prevented us from working on our project with efficiency. A way to alleviate this problem was to use a better adhesive or a hot glue gun to speed up the process. Furthermore, all of our wires were poorly connected to the dc motor, so less power was generated for the fan. We should have also bought more battery holders to have a higher energy capacity, so the fan would spin at a faster rate, as well as a higher voltage dc motor, rather than use the one provided from the Sparkfun Inventor's Kit. Lastly, we figured out that our SolidWorks sketch of our fan was not aerodynamic enough for the fan to spin effectively.

We believed that the greatest positive coming out of this project was that the Arduino code met all of our specifications and requirements to move the bubble wand and operate the fan.

All in all, our group had a fun time working on this project, despite the fan not being able to blow out bubbles. We hope you enjoyed reading our blog posts and following us along our journey in completing our Awesome Bubble Contraption!

 

Group Contributions

Pisal Horth - worked on the apparatus, drew the sketch for the SolidWorks fan
Richard Lim - worked on the apparatus, team blogger, worked on the "literature" for the project
Steven Ouk - wrote the Arduino code, set up the circuits for the Redboard and breadboard, worked on the "literature" for the project

Week of December 9th

For our very last meeting, we were able to buy a new DC motor from RadioShack. We were also able to finally complete our apparatus and tested to see if it would fulfill what we set out to do. Below is a picture of the finished product and a video of how it turned out.

As you can see, the fan was not able to blow bubbles from the wand. We believe that the DC motor did not generate enough power, even at 7.5 volts.

Week of December 2nd

This meeting, every member was present. Today we got our SolidWorks part from the engineering lab. Once we got our part, we attached it to the DC motor and the finished product is shown at the bottom of today's post. Unfortunately, all of the wires from our DC motors detached from their respective motors, therefore, we must get a new one in order to complete the apparatus. This mishap has delayed our completion of the apparatus and project. For our next meeting, we will be getting a new DC motor and finish our project. Stay tuned for next week's post!

                                                                                                                     

Week of November 25th

This week, the group had two meetings, the first on 11/27 and the second on 11/30. All members were present for both meetings. Both meetings lasted for about 5 hours each.

During the first meeting, we completed a sketch of our fan for the SolidWorks portion of the project. The completed part (back orientation view) is shown below:

Next, we began to work on a code for the Arduino portion of our project, which is shown below:

Following these two portions of the project, we continued to work on fine tuning the apparatus to meet the requirements of our initial sketch from last post. Here is a visual update of the actual "Awesome Bubble Contraption."

For the second meeting, we continued to work on the apparatus. We went to RadioShack to buy a battery holder, which would provide more output voltage to meet our necessary specifications. We also continued to work on our code and build the apparatus. Below is a video on how our apparatus works:

Our next meeting will take place some time next week. Stay tuned for our next blog post!

Tentative Sketches of our Apparatus

Today's meeting lasted for about 3 hours. All members were present. Today, we went to Target to buy most of our listed materials on our previous blog post and started planning on how to construct our apparatus.


Below are photos of our preemptive sketch and apparatus.

Our next meeting will be on 11/27 around 5 PM. This meeting will focus on building our bubble machine, drawing a SolidWorks sketch, and work on an Arduino code that will supplement our project. Please check back then for more details.

Weeks 2 and 3

11/14

Every group member was present for this meeting. Our group continued to discuss possible ideas that we would be doing for this project. Four ideas that we came up with were a bubble machine, a Rubik's cube solver, a game, and a remote controlled car going down a racetrack. After further discussion, we have decided that we will be doing a bubble machine. Initial sketches and required materials will be posted in next week's post (see below)

11/21

All group members met today during our lab period. Over the course of this week, we will be gathering our materials and making SolidWorks parts and possible Arduino codes/sketches that will supplement our project.

The (tentative) materials list is as follows:

1) Fan (can be made from SolidWorks)
2) Bubble solution
3) Arduino board
3) SolidWorks parts
4) Container to hold the bubble solution
5) Servo/DC motors
6) Supports
7) Button
8) Sensor

We will hold two more meeting this week on Friday and Saturday. Further details will be provided in our next blog post.

Edit: Tomorrow (11/22), we will be going shopping for some supplies listed above and then start planning on building our apparatus.

22.201 Team LOH Project

Post #1

Following the scheduled lab session, our group decided to meet today (11/8/13) at 2 PM. All members were present. We created our blog and discussed possible project ideas during this meeting. The initial ideas that we came up with were a Rubik's cube solver, a remote controlled car, or an Arduino operated game.

Our goal for our next meeting is to decide among our thought out ideas, which one to actually proceed with for the remainder of the project period. Our next meeting will take place during next week's lab period for about 2 hours.