This is a Title

Goal:

+ Obtain the elusive charged batteries

  This is the final week for trying to finish up both our machine's basic programming and its arm attachment. I (Sammyr) don't know how we'll do it, but I have faith in my group. Today in Monday, our battery needs more juice. So for today, I'm just making the this post.

          We'll hopefully have the machine ready by Friday, that includes its autonomous function and its control via remote.

The problematic batteries in question

No Arm, Just Program

     During this week, we ended up taking up its entirety on programming. Our machine had many problems. The best, or should I say the worst, is that our machine had some internal affairs to deal with.

     During its testing, one of its sides tended to turn more powerfully than the other. We suspected this had to do with how we built it. To any future engineering students, make sure you check every variable as to why things don't go as planned.

     But hopefully, we'll be done with this programming and move on to Arming :D

Currently, this is the code we are operating the robot on.

In related news, the robot has officially been dubbed Weyoun! Yay for Star Trek references!

Programming and Arming

Goal:

+ Finish programming
+ Start arm

This week our group is having to work on both programming our robot to move via our controller and by its own coding.

Our goal is to possibly have programming done by Wednesday and the arm done by Thursday. We'll be crunched for time by I think we can make it. We were bewildered as to how we ended up last and it will not last for long!

The Robot's structure is officially finished for this part of the challenge.

Now We Know, Now We Begin

Mr. Martin extensively guided us on how to begin programming through "ROBOTC". We're stuck with a different brain (microcontroller version 0.5) and needed more aid to work with such an old device. To any future "Principles of Engineering" students, you have to be very patient with using this micro controller.

Our group is in last place but with enough research, hard work, and determination, we'll be able to come back to our original position in this Robot Race.

A closeup of our programming USB.
It's really old technology, so it's rather finicky.

Back from Break

Spring Break proved to be a time of rejuvenation once again. Unfortunately, it ended all too soon and left me no alternative... I had to return to school. Due to a streak of bad luck, we are behind on the robot and it can't even move autonomously.

Our goal this week is to get it running by itself, and also to program it.

We need all the help we can get, but nobody seems available for asking. We'll need to do our best and try not to panic...

The program we'll be (hopefully) using soon

Beginning To An End

This week are minds are set on the hopeful completion of the robot. We should be adding the battery and microcontroller before Friday hopefully finishing on the day of. We've also progressed at a decent pace and are getting much better with our decision making.

The components we've yet to add

Friday!

We've come to the end of another week completing the base portion of the robot. Although it was rather difficult finding the right parts and deciding when and where to use the right tools we did manage. We even taught each other some of the tools names that we didn't know about.

Our robot, hanging out upside down while we tighten up some screws