A typical view in the virtual environment testing software called Quanser.
3D printed model without lid
3D printed model with lid
Duration of Project: Oct 27 - Dec 6
Project Summary: To design a system for securely transferring surgical tools to an autoclave for sterilization. The team was split into two sub-teams, design and computation, and I was a part of the latter.
Main Objectives:
Problem Statement: Sterilize surgical tools with minimal human contact in and safe, steady, and efficient manner.
Constraints: Must use exactly two potentiometers to operate the entire system
Functions:
Outcome: Overall, the project was a success! The robotic arm was able to carry out all its basic necessary functions and more, which including being able to sort all containers correctly in a random order.
As a part of the computation sub-team, my partner and I either both did the assigned task, then compared and gave each other feedback (e.g., pseudocode and flowcharts) or each did parts of a whole (e.g. functions).
Detailed pseudocode of the complete robotics’ arm process and operations
Functions I coded for the final program
An in-depth flowchart of the entire sterilization process of all containers
An event that genuinely caused me a bunch of trouble was when the virtual environment software, Quanser, refused to work after countless troubleshooting sessions. I spent extra time troubleshooting hoping that it would work since that would mean that I would otherwise have to use VMWare, which is although I am very grateful for, it’s quite slow and the process of transferring my work was inconvenient, especially when both my partner and I had numerous issues. After all the troubleshooting, the cause of the issue was identified, but I did not know how to solve it without factory resetting my laptop.
<aside> ❓ I do wonder how it would have turn out either if I had gotten Quanser to work on my laptop or if I started using the VMWare earlier on. Would it have resulted in allowing me have more time to develop higher quality code rather than just allowing me to complete it faster?
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An aspect that I have learned is to handle one part at a time. When it comes to small pieces of code, writing it all out at once and then suddenly testing it may cause quite a few errors but nothing exceptionally hard to fix. On the other hand, when it comes to such large scale programs, once the code runs, various errors may pop up, but the cause of them is exponentially harder to find as a result of not knowing which parts for certain work. At first when I tried to solve it, it was overwhelming. So instead I went back and tested one piece at a time, then tested which parts worked together, and finally resulting in the entire main program running without a hitch.
<aside> ❓ If there were different types of containers, not more though since to fix that all I would have to change is the maximum number of sorted containers in the while loop. Would that have caused to simply add more if statements, figuring out their specific locations, or an entirely new functions in order to sort them to their corresponding autoclave and drawer?
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<aside> ❓ If I were given another chance, I would like to find the exact location of each container’s drop-off location and have the arm move to that location, instead of figuring out how many degrees the arm and shoulder should move by depending on the containers size, since it lead to a few inconsistencies causing containers to sometimes either be dropped outside of the container or hit the edge of the container. This change would result to a precise drop-off each time.
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