28 Jun Colorado School of Mines, Week 3

It’s already the end of week three here at Colorado School of Mines and we have been busy at the RoSE lab. We are just around the corner from starting the build of the IPEx Rover and have been finalizing the parts and materials needed to begin building.

Dual wielding diagrams for the final avionics and software

Let’s start with Monday when we had our PDR presentation (Preliminary Design Review). We came in having compiled all the research, math, and evidence we collected to present what we have come up with for the rover and what parts we are planning on buying to use in the rover. This is also where we are questioned on our work to make sure we didn’t forget anything or overlooked something and if we did we can go and make the change to fix it or look into the issue. I presented all of the avionics we found for the rover and how they would talk to each other. One oversight I made was I didn’t make a chart and show the accuracy, power draw, and reading range of the sensors that would monitor the rover. On Tuesday I started work on fixing the holes in my research and calculations, making a data sheet of all the electronic components to be used in the rover and their specs along with looking back at the batter which became other issue with the stimulant material that we would be using that wasn’t the same material we used in our original calculations. On Wednesday I continued to finish my chart and the rest of my research about the sensors and batteries while also starting the detained wire diagram of the avionics and what will connect to where.

Full wiring diagram of the avionics

Finally on Thursday and Friday I was finishing the wire diagram I started and as I started to finish it I looked deeper into the motor drivers I was using of the arm and drum motors. I was searching for a specific connection that would be on a stepper motor driver called the enable pin (ENA+ and ENA-) which we would need to use to hold the motor in place by turning on one of the electromagnet coils in the motor to hold it in place and found out that the motor drivers I have originally picked weren’t going to work and didn’t have the enable pins I needed them to have. I found new drivers that would work but then another issue flowed with them when using a motor to suspend an arm with a weight in the air they will have to be drawing constant current and constant current draw can crate a lot of heat especially in the motor. This is a big issue because the rover had no way of heat mitigation other than a few heat syncs on the motor drivers in the avionics box. I looked into the amount of heat the motors were producing and how much the motor drivers would be producing and found that it would be too hot for the 3D printed avionics box to handle and the motors would be even hotter. the solution we found was to use heat syncs on two of the sides of the avionics box and directly connect the motor drivers to that and as for the motors to print the housings out of a material with a high temperature tolerance.

Amazing sunset over the mountains

Early morning flight out of KBJC

Outside of the lab this week I was able to find a flight school and continue my aviation journey here in golden and have had a lot of fun learning a new area from the air. I have been continuing my evening bike rides finding fun new routs and continuing to explore the area I am in. In past weeks I have gone north of the house and towards the northern mesa but this week started going south and have found many new rails I want to explore. Gunnar, Luke, and I have also gone to both an escape room and a trampoline park in the past week and had a fantastic time, we ended up escaping the submarine we were put in and had a blast jumping around for a while at the trampoline park. I can’t wait for what’s next!

Escaping enemy waters in the escape room submarine