Adrian's Daily Journal

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Today our Invention challange group cut the 2x4 to get ready for the assembly process. Dr. Neat will not be here tomorrow so assembly will begin the next date the lab is open. I also think I am going to update my journal to include multiple pages.

Today I updated my notebook in addition to verifying the measurments for the invention challange.

This weekend I baught four 2x4 and today Daniel and I measured all the pieces that we will need for our device. We ended up using every piece. It also seems to me that the other teams have come up with "awfully similar" ideas when contrasted to ours.

Today our group presented our progress to the class and Mr. Wilton. We had made quite a bit of progress, the CAD being completely done and the belt prototype running. Conner has completed the air-horn section, I only worry that the ball may not have enough energy to pull the trigger, since it will be moving quite slow due to the conveyor belt. Mr. WIlton encouraged us to actually start building the device and gave some pretty helpful advice regarding the joints. We may either put two 2x4 face to face and clamp them or perhaps use a rod to form a kind of locking mechanism.

Today we worked in on the JPL challenge, we got the belt system to work and although it has no speed control it moves the ball very well. The noise maker also works, it only needs a triggering mechanism. I was also able to get my hands on some epoxy which allowed me to repair the spring mechanism.

While Gabby continues cadding, Daniel and I managed to cut a 2x4 and the half inch PVC pipe with a hack saw. Completeting part A with the exception of the screws.

Apparently someone had messed with part A during lunch and had managed to break the previously functioning spring mechanism. A shopping list and a parts list was also put together and we updated the calendars.

Today we discussed our journals and saw what we had to improve, I need to add the WC form for the Arch bridge challenge.

Today we finished building our Wednesday challenges. Unfortunately the clay was too slippery and uneven, so we had to shrink our design to form a tiny bridge with a span of 1.5" but the block dimension was 11/16 inches so our score was 1.5 ish. Due to my not having powerpoint the WC form was not completed. However that shall occur soon.

We tried making a bridge out of clay and then cutting it into wedge shaped pieces after it was aligned perfectly. The clay is drying, and I hope for the best tomorrow.

Kirk purchased 10lb of air dry clay. We noticed it was abnormally difficult to shape the wedges as they required precision to the nearest mm. Even after scaling up it proved impossible. However Dr. Neat helped us think of a solution that might be to make a bridge out of clay and slice it into blocks ensuring a perfect fit.

Today we started a Wednesday project early, it will count for the quarter grade and is about designing a bridge. An arch bridge that has a maximum ratio of inner span to largest coordinate dimension of the building blocks which all need to be the same size, as well as a countable number. My group has decided to build the preliminary design out of clay shaped into wedges and coated with a high-friction rubber base paint.

We had some time at the end of class to plan the prototype of part C and even got a conveyor belt to propel a ball a short distance.

Mr. Wilton liked what we had, we accomplished everything on schedule, the spring worked fine, and our schedule for the upcoming weeks was also completed. By the end of next week Part A and B need to be completed, as well as a prototype for Part C, the conveyor belt.

Today I finished making the spring device and hope that Mr. Wilton will also find it to his liking.

Today the class had a Wednesday challenge. I bought a few things at OSH, notably nuts, washers and some aluminium, I will probably make the spring system tomorrow.

Today we cut the PVC pipe lengthwise, it wasn't flimsy at all and supported the billiard ball very well. It took a while to make sure the cut was straight, but a few clamps and it all worked out.

I was finally successful in logging into the Filezilla system and my journal is now online at adrians.drneato.com.

Today we presented our progress to Mr. Wilton. We showed him an animated video of the design (see videos), showed him a running cad, a working program. However he was worried that we may not have enough time to finish our project if we continue at this rate. He advised that we prepare an 8-week plan, cut the PVC pipe to see how flimsy it is, and have the Part A, or the spring done by next Friday.

Today I updated journals and at home I am preparing an animated blender to display the the motion of the ball.

Today Gabby continued cadding while Daniel, Conner and I worked on a cardboard prototype. It works fine and can push a ball quite consistently. We did not take part in the Wednesday challenge.

Today our team cadded our design for the invention challenge, a lot of ideas were exchanged. We were unsure if we want to use a conveyor belt or a minecart as a propulsion system.

Today we continued clean-up, our JPL team used a combination of methanol, trichloromethane, and acetone to clean the whiteboards.

Today we watched a movie.

Today we presented the Card tower scores and also spent a lot of time cleaning the lab.

We did another Wednesday challenge today, building a tower out of cards. I was a judge, and along with Gabby and Daniel we helped take pictures, measure towers, and record scores. I will post pictures and the scores when they are available to me. All groups except one managed to build a tower and was entered into the scoreboard.

Gabby, Daniel, Conner and me tried experimenting with various belt designs today and tried to see what we could use on a billiard ball. The spline I bought from OSH is pretty cheap and has good friction, only it slides off the ball. It may be necessary to have more than one belt to push the ball from multiple angles. We also dismantled one of the robots to maybe use the belt, but personally I think the robot's belt is built too specific and may not suit our purpose.

Today I mostly played catch-up on my journal. Thinking ahead, I believe the conveyor belt idea will work quite well. The idea is that once the spring starts a timer that will adjust the speed of the conveyor to allow the billiard ball to hit 20 seconds exactly.

Today my group and I presented our rain gutter ramp and spring mechanism device to Dr. Neat and Mr. Wilton. Apparently they liked the design quite a bit.

Today I decided to buy some springs from OSH and was able to build a device that fired a rod about an inch at high velocity, more than enough to propel a billiard ball. We also found some rain gutters and aluminium beams to use as a ramp.

Dr. Neat's daughter gave a presentation outlining global warming. It brought up the topic of solar coated roads which I thought could be a problem due to LEDs having low visibility during the day.

Today we tried to use PVC pipes as a channel to direct a billiard ball's speed and direction. However due to the PVC pipes all being too small this wasn't possible. I tried experimenting with some springs to make a crossbow device for starting the ball. However this too failed due to the springs abnormal tension.

Today Gabby, Daniel, and me started working on the JPL invention challenge. We need to create a machine that will traverse a ball 5m in exactly 20seconds. Three different methods of transportation must be used. Potential force, gravity, and one other method of our choice. Today was mostly planning, we came up with the idea to use a conveyor belt to perfect timing, the idea still needs refining though.

This Friday, and probably most upcoming Fridays will be spent discussing the Invention challenge. The goal being the delivery of a billiard ball, 5m in exactly 20s, using at least 3 methods of force: potential, gravitational, and one of free choice. Of the ideas presented, although clever, most were not reliable and would probably provide inconsistent times.

Today I worked on my website, updating and upgrading it.

Today we had another Wednesday challenge. We had to make a line out of PVC halves and we had to commute a marble from approximately 5 meters into a can. Apparently our team won, however because we moved the can, it may have been counted as a cheap shot. See WC paper for details.

After combining the layout for all spaghetti groups we combined them to make one layer. However this didn't work due to its sticking to the cardboard, rendering it void. This was solved quickly by using wax-paper. Two good ideas, ground support and side support were declined however we were able to use a thermal gun, accelerating the drying rate of the glue.

Today we continued working on the website, we learned how to add images.

All 45 pieces are dry, unfortunately as the glue dries it shrinks creating hundreds of tiny cracks all throughout the pieces. Which is OK, since it will be coated with multiple layers of glue. For our design we created a hanging bridge that will actually compress the pieces lengthwise, and through this axis, the spaghetti is very strong. Although the final design will be quite heavy.

For out bridge, we discovered that the rebar design is no good by itself, even though it is significantly stronger than a lone spaghetti it will still snap easily. So we decided to build a bigger bridge out of the rebar type pieces. For now we simply prepared around 45 of the rebar pieces to be used tomorrow.

Today we continued with HTML, we were taught to insert local links, the example being the insertion of a .pdf, additionally the 'marquee' command adds a nice effect, although it seems unreasonable to use, since it appears to experience low refresh rates which makes it difficult to read.

This is the first entry on the electronic journal, which has been created today. Hopefully it will evolve over time to look pretty and resemble a web page.