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DESIGN
Mechanical Design
With a bit of discussion and brain storming, we decided to drive each of our
wheels with two motors. Additionally, we decided to make our robot robust and
sturdy in case of collisions. Also, because of the complexity our robot, we
knew that we would have to make the best use of space and parts, and thus for
most of IAP, we spent prototyping different aspects of the robot in search for
the most efficient design. Furthermore, knowing that the majority of
our robot
features would be localized on one side of the robot, we decided to place the
battery pack and the Happyboard on the other side. However, we still had a
center of mass issue that at the end of the competition proved to be a factor
that lead to the failure of our robot.
Electrical Design
We used three phototransistor/LED pairs to determine the orientation of the
robot at the beginning of the competition. Based on which of the two
cases the
sensors gave, the robot rotated to the appropriate direction. These
sensors were
plugged into the analog ports. Furthermore, we used two shaft encoders and
placed them near the main two wheels of the robot to measure how many
times the
gears rotated. This was our primary means of determining if our robot was
traveling straight. Moreover, initially we wanted to use the gyroscope as our
main means of orientation, but found it too unreliable. Hence, we ended up
just using the shaft encoders and the RF system to sweep the board. Lastly,
we attached three bumper sensors (one on the front and one on each
side) in the
case of a collision.
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