ME 333 final projects

See the ME 333 end of course schedule.

Final projects for ME 333 in years 2000-2007 can be found here.

ME 333 Final Projects 2009

Basketball

This project consists of a throwing arm propelled by a Pittman motor is mounted on a turntable and throws the ball into the "hoop." The hoop is wrapped in reflective tape and an IR emitter, receiver pair is used to sense where the IR is reflected most (the hoop with highly reflective tape). An ultrasonic sensor then pings the hoop for the distance of the hoop. With this information, the arm is able to "make a basket."

Robot Drummer

The Robot Drummer is a device that demonstrates high-speed motor control by being able to drum when given commands. Through an RS232 cable, Matlab sends commands to a "master" PIC. The master then sends the commands to two "slave" PICs through I2C communication. The slaves take the commands and implement PID control of the motors.

Automated Fish Refuge

The automated fish refuge allows for the controlled movement of a fish refuge with the goal of recording specific behavior. The mechanical design is completely adjustable and allows adjustable degrees of oscillating movement and orientation of the refuge. The program is primarily in MATLAB for ease of use and the velocity profile can be a sine, square, triangle, or any function that the user inputs. Check out the video!

Automated Xylophone

Automated Xylophone

The Automated Xylophone controls several solenoids which hit various pitches on an actual xylophone based on the note selected. The device has two main modes: using the keypad, a user can choose to either play notes in real time or store songs to be played back later. A video of the Automated Xylophone playing in real time mode can be found here.

Vision-based Cannon

Vision-based Cannon

This project uses a webcam and Matlab to analyze an image and direct a modified USB Missile Launcher to fire at targets found in the image.

ME 333 Final Projects 2008

IR Tracker

The IR Tracker (aka "Spot") is a device that follows a moving infrared light. It continuously detects the position of an infrared emitter in two axes, and then tracks the emitter with a laser. See Spot Run.

Chosen the OUTSTANDING PROJECT by the students of ME 333.

Robot Snake

This remote control robotic snake uses servo motors with a traveling sine wave motion profile to mimic serpentine motion. The robotic snake is capable of moving forward, left, right and in reverse. Video of the robot snake

Programmable Stiffness Joint

The 'Steel Toe' programmable stiffness joint

The Programmable Stiffness Joint varies rotational stiffness as desired by the user. It is the first step in modeling the mechanical impedance of the human ankle joint (both stiffness and damping) for the purpose of determining the respective breakdown of the two properties over the gait cycle.

Continuously Variable Transmission

This prototype is a proof of concept model of a variable ratio transmission to be implemented in the 2008-2009 Formula SAE competition vehicle. The gear ratio is determined by the distances between the pulley halves which are controllable electronically.

Granular Flow Rotating Sphere

This device will be used to study the granular flow of particles within a rotating sphere. The sphere is filled with grains of varying size and then rotated about two different axes according to a series of position and angular velocity inputs.

Vibratory Clock

Vibratory Clock

The Vibratory Clock allows a small object to act as an hour "hand" on a horizontal circular platform that is actuated from underneath by three speakers. The object slides around the circular platform, impelled by friction forces due to the vibration. Check it out!

WiiMouse

The WiiMouse is a handheld remote that can be used to move a cursor on a windows-based PC, via accelerometer input captured through device movement.

Intelligent Oscillation Controller

This device "learns" a forcing function that is applied to a spring and mass system to match an arbitrary, periodic acceleration profile.

Baseball

Sweet Baseball Game

An interactive baseball game inspired by pinball, featuring pitching, batting, light up bases and a scoreboard to keep track of the game.

Ball Balancing Challenge

An interactive game involving ball balancing on a touchscreen with touchscreen feedback and joystick action.