Tri-State Warrior's Team Updates
Monday, December 13, 2010
Individual Reflection: Frederick Dunbar
When it comes to teamwork, I learned that the one of the most important parts of teamwork is organization. Organization is the key to success because the result of good organization is good execution. A good team must be organized and informed so that they can bring forth ideas on a unified front during planning. More important than that is the responsibility of an individual to be a good teammate. I learned that a good teammate will demonstrate unselfishness as a quality trait. A good teammate is proactive and goes above and beyond that which is required of them. A good teammate is optimistic, motivational, and sets an example for his team. I was reminded of how quickly deadlines can approach, and things can go wrong but if a team is prepared, and have planned their map to success appropriately then theses road bump will not deter them from their path. The best team is a made of leaders that use their strengths to empower their teammates. Those teams stand on the cutting edge and present sharp ideas at every turn.
The course was very thorough in the material that it presented. I have prior experience in the field of manufacturing engineering, machining and the lectures were good reinforcement for me. One improvement I would like to see in the course is a longer lead-time to present the finished part. Our team was reluctant to find all time we needed to machine and assembly our bot. When we returned from the break all of the machines slots were full, but some of us “camped out” in the shop until a machine was made available for us to use; however this came at the sacrifice of missing other classes. Another thing that would help improve the course is more real-time access to the grades and GSIs. Perhaps using the Gradebook and Schedule modules on CTools would help.
My performance in this course could have definitely been a lot better. My grades on HW-1 and 2 were not the greatest and I should have put more time into those assignments. In addition, I think that our machine performance could have improved significantly if we had gotten our parts shipped earlier. Our major breakdown came when it was time to control the bot, and getting those parts in earlier would have allowed us to finish early and get a better understand of how our bot responds to the controller.
Regards,
Fred
Sunday, December 12, 2010
Individual Reflection: Jasdeep Khabra
ME 250 was the first class to have really challenged me in my capabilities to think outside the box. As an engineer solutions do not appear in books and on the internet but more from the creativity in the right side of your brain. Conditioning your mind to take a certain path, however illogical can sometimes produce the most effective strategies that one would not have thought otherwise. I believe this is the most fundamental learning experience of the class. Aside from this, basic machining, time management and teamwork were essential skill sets learned that are applicable to the real world today.
The design process itself is one of the most useful tools in today’s manufacturing world. It is a step-by-step process, which funnels not only your creativity but also your focus, taking into account several factors such as time, cost, and the fundamental design principles. Following the design process meticulously can save you from disaster, because design is the initial step and determines the rest of the project as it impacts product cost the most.
Teamwork and time management are essential to survival in the workplace. Your ability to function as a team member can lead to the success or failure of the entire team. In the workplace, rarely will you work as an independent party, but as a group with your peers. The ability to function cohesively as a group will make your team obtain the assigned goal with maximum efficiency and accuracy. Thus, the better you are as a team member, the more productive your input is to the overall effort. Time management functions in a similar manner and ineffective use can heavily impact the efficiency of group work. A structured plan, as well as making sure all team members are on the same page can effectively streamline the process of achieving required goals.
The skills learned in the machine shop were especially useful. Understanding how the lathe and mill worked sparked inspiration as to what could be done to solve a particular problem. The machining experience reinforced ideals of design as well as taught us manufacturing principles like, “measure twice, cut once.”
This course was a great experience however, was sometimes frustrating. It wasn’t the degree of difficulty, but the availability to work in the shop. It is difficult with our busy schedules to have to sign up and fight over machine times. Having the other shops open and more available would have really helped in completing this project. Also, each team getting their own power supply, charger and controller would have also helped in tweaking the functionality of our machines. The trim on left stick of the controller was different than the right stick and this posed a serious problem for our team, as the trim for one motor was different than the other.
This was the first class that really tested my knowledge of CAD software and the elements of design. I could have improved my performance in this class by being more prepared and efficient when it came to group meetings and assignments.
Individual Reflection: Roman Novitski
ME250 was a great experience for multiple reasons, probably the main one being able to get into the shop and work on projects hands on, as opposed to a theoretical class. The ability to learn to use the mill, lathe, and other instruments will definitely come in useful not only in future classes but in life as well. Although, this part of the class was simultaneously the worst as well. The amount of red tape and guidelines and timetables to work around was detrimental to the progress of our bot. It was difficult to get the majority of the group together during one timeslot, groups were signing up for slots they didn’t use, and there was not enough time overall to work in the shop. Towards the end of the project, I found myself, as well as my group members, skipping all our morning classes, working from opening hours of the shop until 4 or 5pm. No matter how much time is spent making a CAD of the bot, the real problems don’t arise until the team is able to get into the shop and create the needed parts. If the class was able to get into the shop earlier in the semester and start work, I think the quality of the bots would have improved greatly.
The lecture part of the class seemed somewhat irrelevant. Sure it was interesting to learn about the different types of bearings, springs, machining specs, and CAD guidelines, and no doubt this will come in useful as an ME major, less time could have been spent learning about equations and calculations. I don’t think there was one time where calculations came in useful during our bot assembly, except for assignments. Sounds a bit naïve, but there are just so many constraints to take into account, there are generally no useful accurate approximations or estimations that could be made. As I said above, I’d like to emphasize the need to get into the lab as soon as possible and actually test these constraints as to get a feel for them as opposed to just having theoretical numbers.
I feel as though I’ve gotten a better grasp on time and team management skills. This class definitely presented a real challenge of working together with the whole team, especially having assignments due just a few days apart and all the restrictions put upon shop hours. No matter, we learned to work with what we had, and were fairly content as a team at our finished product. There is still a general consensus that this course had a lot of material and not enough time.
I’d like to make one final note about the remote controller trim. If there is a way to disable this function on the controller, or have it permanently calibrated, this would save a lot of frustration for future teams. I believe this was singlehandedly the reason our bot didn’t move on competition day.
Overall, ME250 was a great learning experience and I’m happy about our team’s design and execution. I had a great time working with CAD, the machine shop, and my team members. Best of luck to future teams!
-Roman Novitski
Individual Reflection: Joe Martoglio
Final Machine Post
During the semester we made many changes to the design of the bot. We changed the way the door functioned. First we had planned to raise and lower it similar to how garage doors work. Instead we decided to attach it to a shaft and have it rotate. This was a more simple way to raise the door quickly and was less difficult to machine. In the final bot the door was able to move open and close quickly. Also we decided not to use an arm on the bot because that would make it more difficult to fit inside the size restriction.
In the seeding round the bot was able to move, but it could not get over the white barrier in the center of the table. This occurred because the tread got stuck on a ball. We did not anticipate this problem, and were not able to find a solution during the seeding round.
Video our our round at the competition is located at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9YRVHWqlsDU