Evolution of Design

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Design #1 – Sample

Image result for Sample AEV 1182

Description:

This is the original design that each group tested with. It’s very basic in all aspects and on a Concept Screening Matrix would display all zeros so that individual designs made by each member of a team could have a reference to compare theirs to. It has an unnecessary amount of unused space and parts that increase the cost of the design without purpose. Using this design would not be ideal for trying to stay under budget at all.

Design #2 – Long-Styled

Description:

Our team’s second design was inspired by the individual sketches of each of the team members. We decided on going with Joe’s design that utilized the X-shaped base, but realized that it needed a few tweaks to work properly and be efficient on the parts used. In the original design, the base had the longer legs going parallel to the L-shaped arm and the arduino board, but we noticed that the propellers did not fit on the shorter legs of the base, so it had to be rotated so they could fit without adding parts. Knowing that we needed at least a 2×2 inch region in between the magnet from the caboose and the arduino, we agreed on adding a 1.5×3 inch base piece to the front of the vehicle to accommodate for that space requirement.

Design #3 – Short-Styled

Description:

 This is the final design that our group used for the Final Performance Test. During testing for our final run, we came across a problem where the vehicle was too long to get through the open gate with the caboose in time. The AEV took too long start up after the gate opened, so we took it as an opportunity to modify the design of our vehicle to help with this problem. We needed a shorter design, so we removed the 1.5×3 inch base piece in the front of the AEV all together and moved the arduino and the attachment point of the L-shaped arm slightly back to fit completely on the X-shaped base. Still taking into account the space requirement between the magnet and the arduino, we moved the metal angle bracket to the opposite side, thus switching the front and back of the vehicle. This required the arm to be flipped and some code for the motors to be changed a bit so the vehicle could go in the correct direction. After these small fixes were made, a lot of testing had to be done to compensate for the change in vehicle weight and size because we already had working code for most of the final performance test, but it catered to our second design and not the new one. Once everything was working properly, we realized that this design was much more energy and time efficient than the previous design.