DECEMBER:

During December, we wrote and tested our obstacle avoidance code, first on the teaching boards in the lab, then after that was working, on the actual micromouse. The PCB we used for the infrared sensors (for sensing objects to avoid) was designed to have two simple green LEDs embedded in the circuit that would turn on when power was run through the micromouse. These LEDs were to be used as a test to see if the PCB circuit had been soldered correctly and that the IR sensors were working.

Ironically, every part of the PCB circuit except the test LEDs worked perfectly, which had us panicked until we realised nothing was actually wrong. The code took several revisions until it was working properly, but by the end of the month we had successful obstacle avoidance.