Rhys’ Blogs

For October we spent the majority of our time planning out the future of our project. This included setting deadlines and making sure we assigned our tasks to the correct people. Along with creating a team contract and skill matrix we also bult the circuit for the IR sensor we will be using for the micro-mouse. This was quite a useful exercise. As I where all able to learn a bit more about the layout of a circuit. The final thing we started this month was building the IR circuit in protius. This came with some challenges when converting the circuit since we where moving from a 3D plane to a 2D one where wires and elements couldn’t over lap. I would like to have our special feature decided upon by early November so we can start working on that ASAP.

In addition to our group work we have all been working on individual coding assignments. These are designed to ensure each group member a baseline level of knowledge when it comes to writing in c+. They have started off quite simple. However they have been very helpful personally as coding is the area where I am weakest.

The objective for November was to get a working IR circuit built onto a printed circuit board. Other goals included choosing a special feature for our micromouse and finishing the set-up of our website. The first step of making the IR circuit was to get a working model on the breadboards we have in the lab. After adjusting the value of the resistor leading to the IR LED and finding a pair of IR sensors with the same range I am happy with the circuit that Josh, Khizar and I have made.

The next step was to design the PCB itself. The way our team went around doing this was having each member design their own PCB then we would pick the best one. After some discussion about our special feature our team leader chose my circuit since it was the most compact. As for the coding exercises they have gotten a bit more complex and now we are directly working to code the motors.

In December, we made substantial progress on the micromouse building module. We successfully printed the PCB and soldered all the necessary components onto it. Additionally, we connected the PCB to the microcontroller, ensuring proper communication between the two. As a result, we were able to get the micromouse to run in a straight line, demonstrating that the basic functionality of the system is working as expected. This marks an important step in the project, as we now have a solid foundation to build on for further testing and refinement.

This month I fixed the white line sensor circuit and started on my code for the robot. I’ve been able to program a comparator mode as well that is able to give accurate thresholds no matter the environment. I also made a menu system that lets you more easily select which mode the micro mouse launches into. I am planning on starting on combat mode next month. 

This month was focused on doing coding as I had finished building the micro mouse. The combat function was the most time consuming as I needed to figure out a way to make the mouse constantly check the white line sensors so it wouldn’t go out. Since the rest of the team where focused on the website this did mean that I needed to put in some extra time to make sure it got finished. 

This was the last push before competition where I was focused on making small adjustments mostly. I did rebuild the mouse to more compact to reduce the wiring and make it control easier in combat. I am quite pleased with my performance in this module as I learned quite a bit about both hardware and software elements since I built and coded almost the entire micro mouse. It came second in combat which was a surprise to me but some last minute changes to speed and weight made this possible.