The purpose of the Advance Energy Vehicle project was to demonstrate key skills prospective engineers will use in the engineering field in the future. These skills included: project and team management, project documentation, and the design process. This project was entirely team based, and each team of engineers was left to their own devices to manage and meet the deadlines set by the Mission Concept Review and the instructional staff. To begin this project, the engineers were introduced to the creative design process. As the engineers dove deeper into this project, the engineer were forced to revise their concept in order to make the most efficient and successful model possible. Along the way, lab documentation was written and turned in to keep record of the AEV’s evolution throughout the duration of this process. This was to demonstrate how important accurate and clear documentation is when creating and improving products.
The AEV needed an efficient and swift method to complete the goals in the Mission Concept Review. This mission included: travelling to the gate, activate the sensor on the gate and pause for 7 seconds, travel through the gate, pick up the cargo and pause for 5 seconds, travel back toward the point of origin, activate the sensor a second time, pausing for 7 seconds, then returning back to the starting position. This entire mission was to be completed in less than 2.5 minutes.
To determine the best method of completing the mission, the engineers spent the first half of the semester determining methods of extracting and interpreting data in order to draw conclusions about efficiency and performance of the AEV. The second half of the semester was spent employing these skills to modify the AEV base concept—first the AEV itself, then the code, then the efficiency of the AEV. This was done to determine the most effective and efficient configuration and code possible. Based on the data collected and analyzed, the engineers determined that the most efficient AEV design was a concept that had the support arm parallel to the T-shape base. In terms of the code, the engineers determined that a code using short high-powered bursts was significantly more efficient, but due to unforeseen errors, the engineers used a code with a low constant motor speed. Though the engineers knew a servo would make the AEV more efficient and consume less energy per run, the servo was inconsistent and did not function properly, so the servo was inevitably removed from the AEV.
Figure 1: Sample Data from Data Analysis Tool
Figure 2: AEV Design 1
Figure 4: Power vs. Time for Design 1 vs. Design 2
Table 1: Breakdown of Supplied Energy for Design 1
Figure 5: Advance Ratio vs. Efficiency of 3030 Propeller
Figure 6: Advance Ratio vs. Efficiency of 2510 Propeller
Table 2: Concept Screening Method
Table 3: Concept Scoring Method
Figure 7: Power vs. Time in the Final Run
Table 4: Team Meeting Schedule
Team Meeting Notes:
Date: 21–April–2016
Time: 10:30am-1:30pm
Members Present: Kailee Gulbin (KG), Ben Reed (BR), Paul Conway (PC), Grant Miller (GM)
Topics Discussed: Critical Design Review
Objectives:
Today’s main focuses were meeting as a team to discuss and prepare the Critical Design Review.
To do:
-u.osu.edu (KG)
-Memo (PC, KG, GM, BR)
Reflections:
-The u.osu page was not finished completely, need to uploading the memo when completed, and adding figures and tables, and update team meeting notes.
-The memo is not complete. Need to finish writing the analysis and inputting the data, and read over the conclusions and discussion sections.