I am unable to work on any projects due to ongoing lockdown. I’m basically stuck at my relatives’ house away from my “lab”. Working from home and also doing household chores takes up all of my time and energy. As all of you know this lockdown measures have and will be taking a toll on our economy. It will be putting it lightly to say these will be the most trying times of our lives, and I wish the best of luck to all of you.
This blog post comes from an answer I wrote to a Quora question. Which brought the experience I had during my college third-year project exam back to me. More than that it also is an interesting question, which makes you think about what you like more complexity or the experience you had doing the project.
What was your best design as an engineer?
Oh, it is a thought-provoking question you have asked.
There are many projects that I have worked on, which I won’t be able to discuss here.
In the personal project realm, I have a hard time picking between the two projects.
But I have to go with the second one “The Self-Balancing Robot”.
The Self-Balancing Robot
Though, in hindsight, it isn’t the most complicated or deeply technical project that I have ever done. But it is one which I desired to do when I was in Junior College. The self-balancing nature of the robot had always intrigued me.
This project was our third-year project during our engineering course. We were the only two-person team, whereas there were at least four people on other groups.
The robot was simple in its construction, its body, made out of wood and steel threaded rods, for its brain we designed a custom made PCB where micro-controller, an inertial measurement unit and communication devices were connected. Wiring of the robot was up to the mark by routing cables in a way which kept no wires hanging.
To give some context to my romanticising of our implementation of basic engineering practices is that most of the other projects can be at best described as a messy ball of wires wrapped around a few sensors and a micro-controller.
The best part about the project was when we presented the project to the external examiner he was not able to fathom that these third-year kids could make such a well built a robot. We spent almost half an hour trying to convince him that we build this project. During that discussion, he also said to us: “just admit to me you have not built this robot and I still will give you both passing grades”. Finally, we convinced him. And we received excellent grades for it.
Well here are the links to the project’s progression over the time if you are interested.
- https://www.yashkudale.com/electronics/mini-project-self-balancing-robot/
- https://www.yashkudale.com/electronics/update-mini-project/
- https://www.yashkudale.com/electronics/2-update-mini-project/
- https://www.yashkudale.com/electronics/completed-mini-project-self-balancing-robot-using-teensy-3-2/
Let me know down below, what was your best design as an engineer?
