Scope

Use Arduino and its compatible sensors to design and build a car to complete each of the following challenges:

1) Parallel park inside a 14" x 14" parking space either autonomously or via remote control

2) Race to the end of an obstacle course, with exactly 3 barriers, either autonomously or via remote control

3) Navigate fully autonomously through a maze using either the 4" high walls or the 1.5" wide black line on the floor

Grading was based on the car's ability to complete each challenge and on the final report due after the official testing day. Extra points were awarded to teams who completed the challenges with the fastest time and to the team who won "Most Aesthetically Pleasing" by popular vote. 

This project had a $30 budget and a 7-week time frame to complete, along with access to any of the available ME and ECE resources.

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Design

As the mechanical lead on this project, it was my job to design a chassis to enclose all of the electronics, effectively mount the wheels and sensors, and design the best looking car that our competition had ever seen. We decided as a team that it would be fitting to model our car after the iconic blue shell, a strategic item used by trailing players to sabotage any unsuspecting front-runners in the beloved video game, Mario Kart. The enclosure had to be large enough to fit two Arduinos, four sonar sensors, two 360° servos, and all of the wires to hook it all up. The external dimensions of the shell came out to be approximately 7" x 8" x 5", with two servo-driven wheels and one free caster wheel for stability. The chassis separated into two parts: the turtle tummy, which was SLA printed from grey resin on the Form 3, and the turtle shell, which was printed from white PLA on an Ultimaker 3. The shell was specially designed to accommodate the four sonar sensors used for the autonomous portion of the assignment, paying special attention to correctly dimensioning the transmitter and receiver holes for each sensor.  The tummy and shell were painted by hand with acrylic paint and finished with a clear acrylic gloss. The turtle spikes were modeled and printed separately in white PLA and then glued on to the shell after painting. All parts were modeled from scratch in SolidWorks.