Week 6: Adjusting and Re-adjusting

Hello! As unbelievable as it is, we are now finishing up the second-to-last week of SEED! The majority of the week was filled with small adjustments and tweaks here and there to get our medium-high fidelity prototype up and running for testing.

We began the week with assembling the latest prototype. We outlined and then laser cut the specific positions of the different components of our device. To help as a support for these two boards we wanted to use a base with two grooves in which each board would be planted into. To accomplish this task meant a run at two very infamous machines here at the OEDK. The first was a router, which is a sort of table saw operated by hand, that cuts these grooves with a specific depth with a rotating drill bit. From the beginning we knew we were in for a questionable experience because it was a device even our TAs weren’t familiar with. After getting outside help from students more familiar with the machine, we were able to cut a groove and a half until unknown(?) reasons actually caused the drill bit to snap in a half. We had to then use the X-carve which gave us a more precise cut but took infinite more time. After getting through that debacle we were then faced with more waiting time as we needed our shipment of shafts, shaft collars, and pulleys to assemble the rest of our prototype.

To be more productive we then adjusted our focus towards zooming in on smaller components, like our roller. Through Caz’s help we were able to create a mold for our roller using the 3D printed model. This however didn’t turn out to be fruitful either as for more unknown (?) reasons our mold turned out to be squishy and was therefore questionable for us to use it to cast a new roller. However before we sulked due to yet another obstacle, our shipment came in allowing us to readjust our focus towards finishing the assembly of our prototype. Although

Figure 1: Our medium/high fidelity prototype!

higher fidelity components like shafts and shaft collars made our lives easier by being a better substitute for super glue, they still came with problems with their own. Due to the high torque in some of gears in our gear train, the shaft collars on the shafts began to experience slippage which forced us to revert back to using super glue, but this time to connect our gears to the shaft collars. Once we tightened these issues we were able to commence with testing the whole thing!

With testing came more adjustments because with each 6ft segment of film we tried to coat we would notice some areas/components we needed to tweak to make our application more smoother or any other objective. However trying these week and its obstacles may have been, it has allowed us to work on our flexibility both individually and as a team. With our time here in SEED coming to a close we know we have to continue adjusting and readjusting to come out with a result we, as a team, are happy with and come out as a better person, having taken away as much as possible from the summer!

-Mathias Adamu

One Response

  1. Carolyn Huff at |

    Your writing skills are consistently excellent. Harrell and I were pleased with your team’s progress when we visited with you Wednesday. More importantly, your recognition of your grown in both academic and personal qualities is especially gratifying.

    Reply

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