I am back at school for the first time since Dreamcast launch in 1999 (yes, my graduation was that weekend). I have a degree in animation but have been a retail slave all my life. This past August, I went back to school for the first time this millennium and am in an engineering program at a community college. The first class I took was a circuits I class. I was able to transfer in my gen ed stuff from the 90s so I bypassed the English and math classes and just jump right in, but that also introduced issues of feeling lost and confused for a bit since I was so far out of practice.
The final project in the circuits class was to build a simple reed switch motor. You could use the store bought kit and get a 70, but if you used parts salvaged from other things the grade went up. Or if you added buttons, relays, lights, etc. the grade went up even more. If you added a zoetrope or anything light weight (since the motors had no torque at all) to it that it could power the grade went up more.
Well, obviously, I decided to make mine out of LEGO.
I made it work with the 4x AA battery pack from the kit easily enough, but I wasn't happy. So I destroyed a power functions toggle brick to steal the cable and made it work with a LEGO battery pack. But I still wasn't happy. So I made it work with the IR remote too. I could turn the motor on and off at will with a remote control.
I then added a bunch of gear increases to slow down the RPMs and increase the torque on the motor. 1:45 to be exact. I was able to get enough torque out of the homemade motor to power the Carousel set from this past year.
We had to take in the motors and show them off in class last night. I was nervous about going in, thinking I didn't do a good job because I didn't salvage enough stuff from other electronics or add things the teacher wanted. But the response from the classmates told me enough. I took in the motor and the carousel and showed off how it had enough power to drive it. Some of the comments were, "Shit. I am glad he isn't grading on a curve." or "Ok, you win. Just put it away."
The last half of class was using the equipment to measure power draw from our motors as well as RPMs. From eavesdropping from some other groups I had either 2x or 50% higher RPMs than most others, and tons more torque due to the gear work.
Last night felt really, REALLY good. Like it was validation for the months of stress and the few nervous breakdowns I had about the class and feeling like an idiot occasionally. I am waiting for my final grade on the motor, so we will see if my good feeling about it all is justified.
And yes, I intentionally left my foot in the pics. Gotta carry on some traditions here!
