James’ sustainability aim

Being an engineer in this day and age requires a creative and an environmentally friendly mindset in order to manufacture products, such as the micromouse we have developed. To manufacture this sustainably, the cost breakdown of every part of the micromouse must be considered and how to recycle the micromouse once it has reached the end of its life cycle. To keep things simple in terms of cost and design, we used only the standard circuit for infra-red sensors. While this is the case, the circuit was also used twice so that the PCB had infra-red detection on the front and the back. From our point of view at team golf, this is what we saw as the most cost-effective method to achieve a wider range of infra-red sensor detection for our micromouse. In terms of recycling our micro-mouse at end-of-life, firstly the protective shell may be recycled because it is made out of general ABS plastic. Secondly, the components of the micro-mouse such as the motors, touch bar sensors and the chassis may be re-used as they are still fully operational and no major damage was sustained that rendered these components unsalvageable. The infra-red PCB may be stripped of any components that can be re-used such as the resistors, capacitors, infra-red recievers and LEDs, as well as the 14-pin oscillator chip. The copper tracks can also be extracted from the PCB through specialised recycling processes. Wherever the assembly or disassembly of our micromouse takes place, team golf will always adhere to local regulations and guidelines to safely recycle and dispose of any electronic waste, including PCBs.

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