High School Engineering

I participate in my school’s engineering program. Below are the engineering notebooks for my various classes and projects, separated by year.

Engineering 4 CAD Notebook

FEA Beam Design Assignment This assignment is the first part of our introduction to finite element analysis (FEA), a technique for simulating how strong a design will be. We were challenged to make a 180mm cantilevered beam that could support the most weight among the class without flexing more than 35mm. The beam would be 3D printed in PLA and weigh no more than 13 grams. For the first part of the assignment, we couldn’t use FEA and had to design our best guess at a strong beam based off of our research and intuition....

Engineering 4 Code Notebook

The main code repository is located here. Media test: My profile picture A test GIF Launchpad part 1 This is the first in a series of assignments in which I build a simulated launchpad. For this assignment I just had to make the Pico count down from 10 to 1 in the console. Media A GIF of the countdown working. It was filmed very poorly for Reasons. Future gifs will be higher quality....

Wireless Tuneable PID Car

Assignment For this assignment, we had to build a project that implemented PID control in some way. People in the engineering class made groups, and our group was Vinnie Jones @vjones2906 and River Lewis @rivques. We chose to make a car that would use a PID loop to keep a certain distance between it and whatever was in front of it. To spice it up, we decided to make the car tuneable wirelessly....

Auto Music Box Hole Puncher

Assignment For this assignment, we had to build a robot arm. To narrow down the endless possibilities, every student in the class came up with a problem or two they wanted to solve with a robotic arm and pitched it to the rest of the class. People picked projects they thought looked interesting, and groups of two were formed. Our group, Lucia Whitmore @lwhitmo and River Lewis @rivques wanted to create a robotic arm to automate the process of programming music boxes....

Engineering 3 CAD Notebook

Propeller Toy/Collaborative Onshape Assignment For this assignment, two students were to create a small toy that would launch a propeller when you pulled a cord, learning about Onshape’s collaboration features along the way. Partners were assigned different tasks by the assignment that could be done in parallel. For example, one student might be designing the propeller while the other designed the pull cord. Document The document is available for viewing here....

Engineering 3 Code Notebook

neopixel.py A basic test of the M4’s onboard NeoPixel. Flashes through off, red, green, and blue. Assignment For this assignment, we just had to make the onboard neopixel change colors. Code The code is available at neopixel.py. For the sake of space it will not be pasted in full here. Media The project in action. Reflection This assignment was just a test to make sure that everything was running correctly. While there was an optional assignment to make the NeoPixel rainbow, I chose not to do it because I wanted to move on to the other assignments....