Pearl Watson A&D 2023

Hello Post!

Design / Engineering Strength:

I think I am good at knowing myself and my capabilities. I know what is within my skills and what projects / designs I can feasibly complete. But I also don't hold myself back and try to take an easy route. I still push myself to come up with creative ideas, but within reason and completion

Design / Engineering Area for Growth:

I think an area of growth for myself this semester is to have ideas that are out of my comfort zone, while still not being overly ambitious. I want to come up with designs that aren't something I would normally think of, and push myself to be even more innovative and creative.

Documentation Commitments

I want to commit to taking as many pictures as possible during projects that are not complete. I don't want to just document the idea and the completed product, but the journey to the product too.
In terms of my learning, I also want to document my thought proccess and new things I learn this semester. I want to commit to writing the new things I learned that class when I do a blog post
Lastly I want to commit to notating my thoughts during projects. Not just on my ideas and thought process concerning the design, but how I personally feel about my design and how my ideas are coming to life.

PCB Idea Drawings

See below for all drawings

PCB Board - Pearl & Inez

One thing I will remember about the PCB board design, is that simpler is better. Eagle struggled to comprehend our design, and while we were successful in inputting the design from rhino, we faces other challenes. Autorouting didn't seem like it was going to happen for us, so we had to manually draw the route wires for our board.

PCB Board

We made our board inspired by a stegosaurus (Dinosaur). This one in particular is suppost to be sleeping. We put LEDs in each of the spikes of its back, and in place of feet.

PCB Schematic

We made our series in parrelle, that way each LED is the same brightness. We only used one resistor but the resistance should be able to carry through to all the LEDS

Speaker Ideation

speakers b, light and loud

Speaker Feedback

Summary: Lots of people liked the phone and telephone booth idea, they though they would be simple enough to make while also still posing challenges.

I think this session was helpful in thinking about the logistics of these designs, but did not convice me of which design I should do. But I was able to come up with some other ideas taking inspiration from other peoples ideas that they didn't like.

Design Documentation

Model Enclosure

My design is going off of a retro disco vibe, I'm going to have my speakers on the back of this box, and then have the design of disco balls on the front. My idea is to just use scrap acrylic, and so the colors of the disco balls will be all different. My goal also is to have one of the disco balls have a hole beind it, and be able to habe a light shining through to really create that disco ball effect.

Box Front

For my design the wood portion is going to be a simple box, in the front will be my two speakers.

I learned during this prototype to pay attention to dimensions, and to make sure that all of my circuits and speakers can fit in my speaker.

Box Back

On the back of my design I will take pieces of scrap acrylic and use those to create a design of disco balls!

I still need to think about what else I can add to my design if i have the time.

Amplifier Breadboard

October 23 2023

10/27 Replit Coding worksheet 1: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1552MpUaI35LrjasM03iqDPVP6MdWxg1za_BztXMTe_g/edit?usp=sharing

10/31 Replit Coding Worksheet 2:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1IO6w7JhVr32K5oh6cymj7yYJfILHicRcKmQYpaMeweA/edit?usp=sharing

PCB Board

PCB Schematic

Circut Playground: Controlling Lights with Sound 11/6

Circut Playground: Controlling Lights with Sound Challenge 11/10

I tried to complete the challenge where I sperated the lights into three sections of color, which would then light up in order based on the sound levels. I was able to change the colors to green, yellow, and red, which where the colors I wanted. And I was able to make it so that when the sound reached it's peak it would turn red. But I was unable to successfully divide the lights into groups of color.

Digital Project Sketch

For my digital project I'm going to use the circuit playground lights and have them be controlled by the sound of the music. I'm going to cut a hole in my wood, and place a piece of clear acrylic behind it. Then use random color acrylic to create my disco ball design, and place that on top of the clear acrylic. The circut playground will be placed behind the clear acrylic. So that way the light can shine through the disco design!

Light PCB Front

Light PCB Back

Unsoldered Amp PCB

Soldered Amp PCB

Final Speaker Front

Although I've now finished my speaker, I had some challenges before I could get there. I had glued all the sides of my box, except the side with my speakers, allowing me to place my circuit and lights inside. But then I didn't know how I would be able to access my battery from the outside.

Final Speaker Back

So, my solution was to use magnets. I placed magnets on each corner of the wood side with my speakers. And then lazer cut 4 small squares of acrylic. I then hot glued the magnets to the squares, and then glued them to the inside corners of the box. Now my wood side with speakers will stay up, but also can be removed!

Amp Documentation

What did you make?

I made a disco inspired speaker! My speaker was simple in design, I used wood to make a box to actually hold my speakers. I then added acrylic "disco Balls" to make my design a little more visually appealing.

What are you most satisfied with this semester?

I am most satisfied with my digital project. I placed my circuit playground behind hole in my wood, and then covered that hole with some blue see through acrylic. This resulted in a really interesting effect and makes my speaker look even more disco!

What would you do differently?

I think I would take more time to think out my disco design. I'm still really happy with how it turned out, but I would have liked to make it even more interesting.

What lesson will you take from this class?

In future projects I think I will take the time to better plan my projects. Both creativly and also with time management. I think I could have better managed my time to be more productive. And I think I could have planned my final design better.

Digital Project Documentation

GitHub Link: https://gist.github.com/pearlwatson26/6c37f8e3f8f46592756270df007546b8

Project Goals:

I wanted to have my digital project contribute to the disco inspiration of my speaker. So I used my digital project to make one of my disco balls more disco! By using the lights it makes the disco ball come to life.

What I learned:

I learned about problem solving. I had to use the right code to allow the lights to light up with the music. I also had trouble figuring our the easiest way to mount the circuit playground to be behind the hole and acrylic. I ended up using velcro to secure it from the top of my encloser.

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