March 27th

Over the last week our Still in the process has continued its process. We have finished MS8. This means that we have not only finished our CAD model for our machine, but we have also made significant process in actually building our machine. We have machined 8 brackets that will be used to hold our parts of our machine in general, as well as our Most critical Module together. We have also press fitted bushings into some of the brackets. We have also finished machining our Most Critical Module. We have also drilled and tapped the holes on the Most Critical Module, which will be used to attach it to brackets. These brackets are also used to hold a piece of sheet metal, completing our Most Critical Module. Nonetheless, we have finished machining our Most Critical module which makes up our flap and is made out of 2 L-brackets, a cylinder rod (flattened off at each end to form attachment points for the brackets which also attach the wall made out of sheet metal), and the wall made out of sheet metal. In addition, before we began machining our parts, we set out to maintain a high level of precision in our parts. As a result we set very narrow tolerances, (+-.005 inch). While machining our parts we have maintained this level of precision.

Part of the Process that we are still in

Last week we finished MS6. We completed our CAD design as well as our machine drawings and processes for each part of our most critical module. We also received a sponsor and obtained all of our needed parts for our track system as well as the gear or our most critical module, which is our flap. We also finished the flap axle for our most critical module.

We also completed the motor lab. From this we found how the voltage input related to the torque, as well as the efficiency, which help us choose our gear ratio, which is (for the planetary gear box) 25 to 1.