User:Lsun224/enes100/My Work 1

Write problem/project Goal
Construct a Rube Goldberg Machine

My First Task
Look up examples of Rube Goldberg Machines. Continue work on Stepper Motor/Arduino combo for use in moving the gears

Summary of actual work over first weekend
Work went according to plan

Week1 Narrative
Tried playing with the arduino again over the weekend. The arduino itself still works and software is running correctly, but the motor is not working. Copied code from the arduino website but it did not work. Soldering may still be faulty on the wire connections. Will try to fix on Wednesday. It is also possible that the code I used is incorrect for the type of motor i have. Found a site that has some interesting info on contests and winning designs, etc.

My Second Task
Record what you are planning on doing for the team during the second weekend.

1. Experiment with new stepper motor

2. Map out motor's wiring

3. Try attaching to arduino

Summary of actual work over second weekend
How is what you did different than what you planned?

For the most part, everything went according to plan

Week2 Narrative
Tell a detailed story describing what you did for your team over the weekend.

Began by mapping out the wires. With the pointed end up, from right to left, the pins are:

1+2: Ground

3: Doubles the speed of the motors rotation (only if plugged into the -12v)

4: If any voltage is applied, will stop the motors rotation. If touched to ground, will do nothing

5+6: Power (12v?)

Note: if you reverse the ground and power wires by accident, the motor will not spin in reverse. Rather it will spark and it will hurt. Also it will overload the power supply. Luckily it has overload safeties and still works

Closeup of the wire connections

Video of the wire test

Aside from stopping the motors rotation, still not sure what wire 4 does. According to the tutorial it is likely one of three things: touch to ground to make motor spin, touch to ground to cut speed in half, or hook to scope to see motor output. Touched it to ground and it did neither of the first two, so by elimination one possibility is that it shows the motor output. Cannot check this until returning to the lab next week. Wires keep falling apart. Need to maybe solder them togethor.

As for attaching the motor to the arduino, I believe Zach was working on hooking them up. He said something about being able to wire the two together and control the spin of the motor with the blink command. Will contact him about his progress. For now I will continue experimenting on my own with the motor and arduino as well as wire combinations with the power box

My Third task
Record what you are planning on doing for the team during the third weekend.

Continue testing wire connections and maybe incorporate arduino into tests

Summary of actual work over third weekend
How is what you did different than what you planned?

For the most part went according to plan

Week3 Narrative
Tell a detailed story describing what you did for your team over the weekend.

Experimented with plugging the motors various wires into arduino ports. On the left side of the arduino you can plug the wire 1 into 5v or 3.3v and wire 5 into the right side where it says ground. The motor should spin. However, 3.3v is not enough power so plugging wire 1 into 3.3v will not spin the motor. Some other configurations i found: reversing the above setup wire 1 to ground and wire 5 to the 5v will turn the arduino off (we know it didn't short it out because as soon as you pull the wire it turns back on). Plugging wire 1 to 13 and wire 5 to ground will turn the LED on (even with the blink command, the LED will not turn off, but simply grow slightly dimmer). If i remember from the beginning of the semester Zach said he found a way to reverse the spin of the motor, ill ask him when i see him again. Will upload a video of weekend tests as soon as youtube decides it wants to work.

Update: Looked at Zach's page. No word on reversing motor spin with arduino. However, he says that you can control the spin of the motor with the blink command. Should be interesting to see

My Fourth task
Record what you are planning on doing for the team during the final weekend of project work.

Map out wires of new motor

Summary of actual work over fourth weekend
How is what you did different than what you planned?

Followed according to plan

Week4 Narrative
Tell a detailed story describing what you did for your team over the weekend.

Tested the wires with the motor, results are as follows:

From left to right with point facing up....

Pin 1+2: Ground

Pin 3: Does nothing, motor still spins normally

Pin 4+5: Power (12v? maybe 24)

Pin 6: Nothing...

Pin 7: Halves the speed when touched to ground

Not sure what pins 3 and 6 do, but the rest make sense, since they were approximately the same as with the other motor

Update: So I just remembered something....there was a tutorial here. Ok so judging from the tutorial, pin 3 is supposed to turn the motor on (which makes no sense) and pin 6 is meant to hook up to a scope to see the output of the motor

Complete Team Page
Fill out the Team Form (should have already copied the form, created the team page, linked to it and started filling it out).