Final Blog
Hi my name is Luis! When I first started my building my tank, I thought I was never going to finish. I thought that it was impossible and that my project would never run because it would not be complete by the time the six weeks were up. Well, it turns up that I finished my project with a week and half left to the program. It would have been impossible if I did not have my best friend with me who is Scott. He was ahead of me in this project so he knew what he was doing and when I needed help, he was always there to help me and cheer me up. I was excited and happy that I actually accomplished this major goal. The way I completed this goal was by putting a lot of effort and hard work into my project and also putting a lot of passion in it. First I started by building the chassis of my tank. That was actually pretty easy and I got that done in one day. After I build the chassis, I messed up my tracks because I thought that I had to cut them, but I did not have to do that. The way I fixed it was by super gluing them together and making sure that it sticked and did not fall apart. After I solved that problem, I had to mount the motors on with the gears and the wires. The problem with that was that my double motor gearbox had not arrived yet because I ordered the wrong one. So, when that arrived, with the help of Matt (who is my instructor) made some holes in my chassis so I could mount my motors. After I mounted my motors I tested them with a AA battery and it they worked fine. Then for the first time, I started working with the arduino. I downloaded the app to my computer and then I used the psx2 code. I got this code from paulbleisch.com/. I did some modifications to it because I had to change around the pins in the arduino. Then when I got that figured out, I put the wires corresponding with the correct pins. I also wired the the correct wires to the wireless dongle for the playstation 2 wireless controller. When I four AA battery pack came, I connected the red wire to VIN on the arduino and the BLACK wire to GND. Then I used a nine volt battery to give my tank more power and make it move faster. Along with that, I had to use type D for the gears because type A did not have enough torque to make it move with all the things that it has to carry. I had an ultrasonic sensor, but I could not use that because it was broken. When I tried to install it, I found out because I tested it with another sensor and the same code and the other sensor worked. Then when I tried to use it with my sensor, it did not work. So, instead of ordering another one, I thought that I could put tail lights on my tank. So, I used Blink from arduino and I modified it to fit my code and I doubled it so that I can get both LED’s working. I had to solder both the GND wires because I only had one GND pin left. I used pin 10 and 2 because those were the only ones left. I made a spoiler and I also made bigger holes in it so that I can put my LED’s through there and so that they can be stable and not move around everywhere. Overall, it was a great experience. I learned a lot in Bluestamp engineering and I never thought that I was capable of doing any of this work. I thought that it was impossible and that I did not have the right tools in me to finish my project. Well, along with the help of my instructors and my friend Scott, I got through my project and it is great and complete. I am happy with it and I am closer to becoming an engineer.
This is where you can watch my final video!!!
Materials List1(Click on me!)
RC Tank Code
RC Tank Schematic (Click on me!)
Main Project Second Milestone!!!
For my second video what I did was simple. I didn’t do much because my tank was basically complete. The only thing that I needed was the ultrasonic sensor. I tried to put on my tank, but it didn’t work. At first, I thought it was my code, but then I tested it with another sensor and I found out that it was broken. So, instead of ordering another one and wasting time, I came up with another idea. I thought about using the Blink code and doubling it to make led headlights. I had to solder both the GND wires together so I can power to both of my led lights. The reason I did that is that I only had one more GND pin left on my arduino so I had to get power to both my led so soldering them together was the only way. I fixed up some of my wires and changed batteries too. I mounted my dongle for the controller on the back of the tank so it didn’t dangle anymore. I put a heat shrink on the front shaft of my tank because I didn’t want my leds shorting out because the bar is metal. That’s pretty much all I did for my RC tank!
This is where you can watch my second milestone video!!
Main Project First Milestone!!!
So far, what I have done to the tank is build it up to the almost completed stage. I still need to install the distance sensor so that it stops when it sees anything in its way. So, they way I build the tank was using the a track and wheel set with two long boards. The first one holds the motor which I screwed on with two bolts to the chassis or board. The battery pack holds 4 AA batteries. On the top board, I have the Arduino Uno with the motor shield and a 9 volt battery. On that board, I also customized it by using the wheel mounts and I made it into a spoiler. I held down the battery pack with tape, but I tried to not use as much tape. To hold down the top board, I used two small zip ties closer to the back. I needed to use the Psx2 which is the code that makes the tank move. In order to use the wireless controller, I broke open the dongle which is the wireless part and I connected it to the arduino using wires so that it didn’t fall off. The same Ps2x works with the controller because that what the code was made for.
This is where you can watch my first milestone video!!
The parking sensor tells you how close you are to the other bumper of another car while parking. It uses ultrasonic waves to detect the distance of another bumper of a car or object. When a car is close to an object the same height of the sensors or when it is parking it, you will hear a loud beep telling you that you are close to the other car or object. This makes it easier for the driver to park and it is also an easier way to park your vehicle. The parking sensor is made of a lot of different components. Some are: jumpers, diodes, resistors, IC mountings, capacitors, electrolytic capacitor, trim potentiometer, screw connectors, buzzer, transistors, and sensors. On the base PCB and on the receiver PCB, the resistors create a precise quantity of resistance for inserting into a circuit. The diode has a low resistance of energy flow on one end and has a high energy of flow on the other end.The electrolytic capacitors use an ionic conducting liquid to get more capacitance per unit volume. The buzzer makes a loud sound to let you know how close you are to another object. The screw resistors on both the base and on the receiver is what connects both of them along with some wires. The IC mountings help the sensor to not get damaged, so they are an important part of the project and there are 6 of them on my project. The capacitors store energy in an electrical form on the field. The sensor requires a 12V battery, but on my project I used a 9V battery with 2 AA batteries and then it was converted to using 12V all together. The ultrasonic parking sensor is another way of creating an your own sensor and installing it in your car.
Some of the problems I faced were having the resistors in the wrong place and not having any jumper wires in place. The problem with the resistor was that I confused the colors on the resistor. It was only two that I misplaced and because of that when I completed the whole project and connected the battery, the sensor only beeped and did not do anything else after that. The other problem was that I did not have the jumpers in at all and that did allow the flow of electrons to flow through the base board. The challenges I faced throughout the project was basically the soldering. I nevered solder before and I did not know how much solder to use on my parking sensor. I over soldered and had cold solder. My final reflections are that the parking sensor is not that difficult to make. All you have to do is make sure you read all the directions carefully and make sure that you have all the parts in the correct order and place them in the right place. If all that is in good condition, then the project should turn out great.
This is where you can watch my video!!!