#tomblog

The team came into labs for the last week of the easter break in order to ensure the mouse was no longer in a state of disrepair. We arrived bright and early and spent the next few hours troubleshooting each and every component in order to find the fault. After much hardship, we concluded the microcontroller was faulty. Our suspicions were confirmed when the new microcontroller board was installed. In order to prevent any further damage, we decided to install a transistor switchboard to control power to LEDs, Line followers, and the IR PCB. This resulted in a more efficient micromouse as now any unused modules could be switched off. After some research I concluded that white LEDs were superior to yellow when it came to white line sensors, as the white LEDs drew far less current, and the LDRs were more sensitive to white light. Toward the end of the month we were finally able to print a full shell. However, due to an error with the 3d printer, the shell was scaled down and was too small to fit. Luckily I was able to sand the inside of the shell to make it fit. We faced a major setback when we noticed one of the tachometers had again become disconnected. The ribbon cable's connection to the motors was very weak so very little force was needed to break it. This set us back so much because accessing the broken connection meant disassembling the entire micromouse. Next stop was Gregynog! We worked long into the night to make sure everything was as we needed it to be, and the following day we were assessed. The white line following, obstacle avoidance, and combat was flawless! Our presentation also went very well. We were all nervous when it was time for the combat finals, but Clyde was more than ready, and we won first place!

For the first session of the month I had to re-solder a few resistors on the IR sensor PCB, as it was far too sensitive, we reverted to the resistor values given in the handout, as they seemed to give optimum sensitivity. We then filmed our third vlog where we discussed our progress over the last few months. Unfortunately, we had to re-film as the sound recording wasn’t to a high enough standard. During the next session we designed a switch board, so that we may switch between modes without needing to re-program the Micromouse. We also designed a circuit with two RGB LEDs to use for debugging and mode selection. This became a new special feature in itself, and has saved us a lot of troubleshooting time. The next week was when things started to become somewhat difficult, as we designed (and re-designed) our white line sensors. Matt programmed the sensors to calibrate with every use, to allow for different ambient lighting. The re-design was necessary as the yellow LEDs used approximately 28 mA EACH, whereas white LEDs use around 4 mA each. The white LEDs also give a greater voltage difference between black and white surfaces. It was around this time things started to go wrong, sensors were not calibrating properly, and the status LEDs ceased to function correctly. As it was the last day of term, we decided to come in for the last week of the easter break to re-visit the problem.

It’s all coming together! The first couple of weeks were spent soldering the pcb for the IR sensor circuit. We had a few problems with wrong resistor values causing the sensors to become too sensitive, we rectified this by swapping them for larger resistor values. I then began soldering wires to the bumpers and attaching them the Clyde’s chassis, while Matt worked on the code. We were then able to test obstacle avoidance for the first time, using a bumper we had 3d printed. Toward the end of the month we were finally given our own battery, so we could finally test our bumpers without needing to be plugged into a power supply. We then discovered a broken port on our microprocessor pcb which was the reason behind one of the bumpers not working. The problem was caused by the port not being properly soldered to the input, which was quickly fixed thanks to Augustine.

No progress with Clyde this month due to exams, which luckily went better than expected. We've got big plans for the next month, hoping to make some major progress with sensors and programming.

Fantastic progress this month, our pcb was printed and I've almost finished soldering the components. We also sat a short microcontroller interfacing test, on which I scored above average! During the last session, Matt and I made two white line sensor circuits and briefly attached them to Clyde to make sure they worked correctly.

We also filmed out second group vlog discussing the various successes of the month. If we continue at our current pace, I am confident we will be ready to go by the end of term!

I feel the first month has been very successful as we’ve made significant progress in such a short time, here’s hoping next November will be as fruitful!

Hi! Same here actually, this is a sideblog which is why I don't much. But I'm always happy to talk! :D or if people wanna say hi to me on my main blog they can always ask for it :)