Tuesday, April 12, 2011

Reflection

In my opinion, we accomplished our objectives very well. We were able to create an innovative and unique design that completed the process with a lot of time to spare. In the future, I think we would use a magnet instead of using our spring because the major flaw in our design was that we could only complete the process if the wooden marbles did not follow a metal marble. The results fulfill the problem statement very well because we were able to sort out all 5 different types of marbles into different bins in less than two minutes (1:20 seconds was roughly our time). Freddy and I have learned the importance of an attention to detail, because the smallest adjustments produce a misreading that leads to a failed attempt, whether it be with the bins that catch the marbles pushed off by the spring, or the gate that lets the photo resistor differentiate between the colors of the marbles. We have learned how to program as well, our program was very complicated and we used a couple subprograms to achieve our desired result. We had a few challenges that faced us with regard to working in a team, one of us would bump something that we had been working on fixing or change part of the program which instead of helping us take a step forward, made us take two steps back. The purpose of this design problem was to teach us to work in teams, be able to program and use the various Fisher robotics parts, and finally show us some of the skills needed to use later on in our engineering careers. These skills include: teamwork, attention to detail, perseverance, dedication, creativity, and most of all, the importance of consulting with our peers on common problems.

1 comment:

  1. Thanks for sharing your experience. You and Freddy worked well together and achieved a great result.

    Consider how you could improve the "readability" of this post. We're aiming to be efficient and effective with our communication!

    Thanks.

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