User:Amotaher9224/ENES 100/Project 1: Bicycle turn signal

Week1 Narrative
The first project for ENES 100 assigned to my team, which includes myself, Asad Gillani,Carlos Fernandez, Eldrick Kinmakon,and Kevin Szostak was to design a bicycle turn signal. We were thrilled to have this project and every teammate showed enormous interest toward this project. · Each year, more than 500,000 people go to the emergency room for bicycle injuries. More than 700 people die from those injuries. · Children 15 years and younger are the biggest risk. · Bicycle injuries and deaths cost $8 billion each year. After intense hours of brainstorming and defining the problem, we had agreed on a basic design for the bicycle turn signal. Our objective was to create a bicycle turn signal that would mounted on a back of a bicycle and it would have left and right signals to assist the rider make safe turns and warn traffic of their presence. Safety of the rider seemed like a huge priority for this project, so we tried to mold design around the safety concept. So our goal was to create a very simple but yet effective turn signal that would portable enough to have the ability to switch bicycles and deliver maximum safety. We plan to execute by having a big enough LED matrix on the back of a bicycle which could be seen at night by cars and pedestrians, the LED turn signal will controlled by 2 independent switch mounted on the front handle bars of the bicycle. So for week 1, the the team researched 4 major components of this project. We decided we need to focus on, and we came up with POSSIBLE options - 3D printed case - Purchased factory manufactured housing from online - Use a med-kit type box - use everyday found boxes such as Altoids boxes to house the Arduino - Use a USB -Battery - Generator by using the mechanical kinetic energy of the spinning wheels - Arduino - Simple circuits - Direct wires from LEDs to battery - Voice control - Switches - Gyro meter, which would activate the turn signal when the bicycle leans left or right when making turns.
 * Housing-Figure out ways to house the components and parts of the project.
 * Power- Figure out ways to power the the device
 * Interface- Figure out a the main "brain" for our device, something that will control the LEDS through coding
 * Control Options

Week2 Narrative
For week 2, we tried researching the ideas that derived from the brainstorming. We tried a taking a deeper look at the possibilities and options which would be beneficial to this project. We crossed out the least realistic and went for more convenient options, so we narrowed down our ideas. For Housing- We decided that we will custom 3D printed back housing with our specifications. we measured the box would need to have the dimensions of about 3.6in x 5in x 1.8in to fit a Arduino and a battery. For Battery- We decided that a 9v alkaline battery would be efficient to power 20+ LEDs. For Interface- We decided that a Arduino would be the best because it of it huge coding availability which will allow us to have 100% control of the LEDs lighting sequence, and it would be also easier to implement a switch and a buzzer. For Control- We decided basic pushbutton would be great because it will be the most convenient and easiest to merge in with the Arduino and the LED. Simple switches eliminates the hassle of overdoing the project and it keeps true to its integrity as it maintains functionality.

Next, All of the teammates will have to familiarize themselves with how to operate the MakerBot 3D, and also get used to the Arduino's coding and how to wire the circuit. We will also learn wiring of the LEDs and Switches to the breadboard/Arduino.

http://www.adafruit.com/products/340

Week3 Narrative
During week 3, we had a much clearer idea of our design after narrowing down our ideas after considering all the pros and cons of each different options. This week we move away from the brainstorming to actual hands on prototyping. We initially thought about buying a 8x8 LED matrix from SparkFun.com, however after much discussion, we agreed that the 8x8 LED matrix would be a square and it would be hard to make arrows from both sides, and also shipping from a 3rd party company would delay our project, so we needed something bigger, and needed it as soon as possible. I started to look around the room to look for anything that might a good housing for a LED matrix. And the OEM cover from the bicycle caught my attention. I thought we could drill holes through the glass and drill the shape of arrows on both sides, and stick the LEDS through the holes and use that as our design. We made holes on the OEM cover, and successfully installed the LEDs, however something was missing. The LED looked a bit small from far away, that defeated the whole purpose of safety. We were back to square one. At this point, frustration was obvious, however the team went back to the drawing stage and discussed what could used to make a matrix? 3D printing a matrix was a suggestion, however at this point none of the team was certified to use the MakerBot, and other teams had been printing their project's components for hours. However after a while, I found "lego" pieces in the machine room, which was mostly parts for previous projects/ robotics projects. I thought this the "lego" pieces could come in handy, this could be used a housing for our LED matrix, we could stick the LEDs through the end of the lego and have and back housing.

All together what seemed pretty straight forward, building turn signals, turned into a great deal of work. We decided not to use Sketchup or CAD to draw up our project because each bike is different and what were making has no moving parts just light bulbs that have electricity passed through them. Next week we will try and finish our prototype by printing our housing on the 3D printer, since this week it was having problems keeping itself at the right melting temperature. If it is not working by next week we will have to come up with another option for housing the Arduino, LEDs/bread board and power source.