Making

countdown and code

Yip Wan Ting Making, Testing 0 Comment

We planned to go to the swimming pool. Especially after a week of correspondence and confirmation with the staff at the SRC — anticipation was at its climax. 

But we had a few problems that remained unsettled… for a start; we had yet to seal the dome with silicon, and silicon takes a day at least to dry… and a lot of skill to apply an even layer without air bubbles… its a whole team effort.

<image of dome, unsealed.>

<the 3-men operation>

or at least, that was how it was for the first dome.

Then we realised we also had to settle placement of the electrical components — the RPi, the wiring, the mosfet channels… which required some hot glue and a long piece of cardboard; recycled from an unwanted piece sitting in a dusty corner in the lab. We took turns settling that part of the hardware, and before we knew it, it was time to set out for the pool. 

The only thing stopping us was, well, Tony. The silicon wasn’t dry, we hadn’t found a good source of battery, and our pumps remained untested. Tony wisely advised us not to go. We were not ready. And it was a good thing we listened too, because the sequence of events that followed thereafter really highlighted that our boat was not yet prepared for the trip. 

Justin found us a lithium battery that had enough watts to power the RPi, but not necessarily the pumps. Without testing the pumps with the new battery, we made a difficult and painful team decision to reschedule the pool “party”… and continue the lab “party”. 

 

On the plus side, we learnt a lot more about planning ahead — other than getting permission early. And also how to solder! 

Learnt a little from DnT back in secondary school, but never really understood the use of it; or went any further than circuits.

This time, we soldered an electrical component and wires, and basically glued it while keeping the circuit “electrically functional” (if, I’m making sense at all…I realise I really am bad at trying to describe or communicate an idea for others to understand me…) 

Justin guided us and demonstrated the first half — and then the challenge was to repeat it on the other side.

 

I was so “skilled” that I burnt the component on the first try and we had to do it again… 

In other news — another skill! “Heat shrinking”! The use of this cool rubber thing that shrinks when exposed to high heat and results in a snug piece of insulation. 

On hindsight, glad to have missed the swimming pool to learn this cool thing you can do in the lab! 

After 4hours it was finally time to test the battery and the pump — and then the second challenge hit: the pumps wouldn’t turn on despite the code having been tested before. Something went wrong, and we were at a loss with what the difference between battery and power source could have done… 

 

Software development in a nutshell: 

Justin even double checked that there was a current running through… 

Being beginners at coding; especially for the websites and using unfamiliar codes like html and java, we were bummed. But thanks to Justin’s investment in our project and his experience in coding, it wasn’t long before he was able to pinpoint the problem, guide us, and then delete all his work to ensure that we could do it on our own — by ourselves. 

And once we finally figured it out, it was about time we called it a day. 

silicon gel

Yip Wan Ting Blueprinting, Making 0 Comment

Today was a mix of 3D printing, coding, and finally a family get-together figuring out how silicon gel works. 

Who knew you needed a gun to extract the gel out? and that you needed 3 people? or at least, we were all helping out at some point until we realised we were redundant… I guess that is how efficiency comes about. 

Above is the end result of Anita leathering a healthy amount of silicon onto the piece… and below, a snapshot of us at work.

In other news, we have also successfully installed the pumps onto the holders! 

In the words of Tony, 

“Work smart not hard.”

Also Tony: “Please clean the pipes they’re so dirty.” For the longest time we thought he was joking until he actually passed us the alcohol spray… 

With that; here are some more B-roll of 3D printing — no matter how ‘lame’ the design is, I always get excited when our print is being made… I think I speak for the rest of the team when I say its mesmerizing to watch how something digital can become physical and tangible with a spool and nozzle… squirting out an intricate pattern layer by layer… into the thing we need.  

software inferface

Yip Wan Ting Blueprinting, Coding, Making, Raspberry Pi, Tinkering 0 Comment

After a long and arduous hours at the MnT lab and consulting the mentors tirelessly, the boys have finally emerged… well, the first battle is won. 

this is what we plan for the interface to look like. But of course, its taking a lot of willpower and brainpower — thank you guys — to get past the steep learning curve of figuring out codes and how to code… 

updates on software side:
—adjustable water pump power
—added an accelerator, halfway through
—VPN concept for remote network control

—Justin helped and guided us for VPN
—we managed to pass a value from frontend to backend, and connected the pumps to the slider dynamically
—we made the website nicer (with a new font, and a full background)

Definitely not an easy feat, and as the team member working on the hardware side its mad respect to watch them sit themselves down and determined to finish what they set out to do at the start of the day! 

In other news, its time to get more pumps and mosfet channels… 

the learning experience

Yip Wan Ting Blueprinting, Brainstroming, Making, Uncategorized 0 Comment

We were too idealistic with the print, and it came out with too many gaps such that it wouldnt hold the pipes tightly. We were then stuck with either adding amendments, or redo the entire print. 

it felt like a waste, especially having troubled Tony and the team to power up the large printer for us. But Tony kindly said otherwise, that it was a learning experience! #positivethinking 

 

and so with that we got to work on a new design

but first, a quick test of the various dimensions that could fit — something we didn’t want to do initially, but realized the importance of doing so. We thought this step could be omitted because its a waste of materials, and takes time in itself to print — but we learnt the hard way that there is greater wastage when the dimensions are imprecise… 

 

inner and outer rings

Yip Wan Ting Making, Tinkering 0 Comment

It was time we tested the pumps… but one thing that stumped us was the connection: it was a center ring, not the typical battery ends of + and -, and we were once again dumbfounded. 

Tony tells us it is called a ‘Barrel Plug’, and a quick google search shows that its quite a ubiquitous plug design!

Justin had to educate us from scratch; linking the concepts of the cathode and anode, we learnt that the center inner ring is usually the positive end, and the outer ring, is the negatively charged end. 

He let us try cool machinery to test out the different charges, and it was so fascinating to see electronics work from theory to reality. 

Maybe also because we are biological science students, so the whole experience was eye-opening and enlightening, albeit a normal occurrence to the mentors in the lab.

Justin also introduced this power supply that lets you vary the voltage and current, and this may sound like common knowledge; but for someone without O level background, I learnt that V= IR… but the way I learnt it was not the conventional: as opposed to seeing it as a solution in a question paper, I saw it as a practical solution to a problem we were actually facing. And it gave a whole new dimension to V = IR.  

we didnt realise we needed this, but Tony was kind enough to lend us 4, and we got about to connecting the pumps to the mosfet board and the RPi…

cut once measure twice

Yip Wan Ting Making 0 Comment

The final step was of course to get approval from Tony himself. So after updating him, he gave us the green light! 

And in essence: here is a video montage… sorry the choice of standard background music is limited 🙁

“Eh why the boys make the girls do this kind of work one” 
“Eh why not leh this is so fun… we’re bio students let us live”

Of course, while we were busy with that, the boys were busy with their own struggles: the Raspberry Pi, and figuring out how to code and debug things… but most importantly, impart knowledge to us…