Final Project Journal

Project Ideation

1- Tell us about the idea of your project. Why do you care about this? What were you inspired by? Include images and videos of similar projects

My idea is a portable device with LCD shows the time since last time I took my insulin dosage.

I do care about this idea as insulin is the one of the most important things in the life of people living with type 1 diabetes (T1D).

I was inspired by a device called Insulcheck, that do the same exact thing I want to do.

Project Construction

2- Explain the CAD process of your project. How did you use the software to design your project? (List the softwares/tools/materials...etc that you used)

I started the process by doing low fidelity cardboard prototype shown here in order to discover any mistakes and make sure that all dimensions are correct.

I moved to Fusion 360 to design the enclosure.

I started with the bottom started new sketch, selected the plate I want to design on, draw only 1/4 the bottom and from mirror option I chose to mirror this 1/4 to from the half of the bottom and then mirrored this half to form the whole bottom.

I followed this technique to insure all dimensions are the same.

I followed the same approach in all other parts to make sure everything is in place and all dimensions are correct.

Designing steps was explained in details in week2 & week3.

In order to add holes for my electronic components, I downloaded all components from GrabCad.

I downloaded the components with extension .Step and followed the same process explained here

I added my components to the sketch and then did project

Chose new sketch button (first button from the left with the plus sign

Plate selection

Mirror option (I selected all lines I want to mirror then chose the mirror line "the line that will be between the 2 sides and ok")

Bottom.

Bottom side.

Back side.

Top of the box (place where insulin pen will be kept)

Side of the box

Front of my box

Drawing the limit switch holder was the easiest part, on the side of the limit switch I started a new sketch and draw a rectangle and 2 circles based on the shape of the limit switch then I did extrude.

(The below photo might not be clear because of the limit switch colors and I have 2 fully defined lines they are colored in black :D)

And now comes the long waited moment after lots of edits, Ctrl Z and design modification.

Parts assembly together as shown below.

YouCut_20220325_165622830.mp4

3- Explain the fabrication process of your project. How did you use the machine to fabricate your project? (List the softwares/tools/materials...etc that you used)

I used laser cut machine to fabricate my design.

I added all DXF design files in LaserWork to turn it to .RLD file since this is the file the machine accept.

Set speed to 15 and power to 70 (default setting for 3MM plywood)

After uploading the file to the machine and adding the wood sheet, I tracked the frame to make sure the wood sheet is in the right place then I pressed run from machine's options.

The full process of fabrication explained previously in week2 and the tools used explained in week1

In order to assemble the limit switch to the design I printed a small shape looks like letter "L" in order to tie it to the limit switch and the top part using screws.

The holder is very small that took 11 minutes and only 1 gram to be printed on the 3D printer

To attach the pen and make sure that it press the limit switch I decided to use a rubber band since it is flexible and can hold the pen regardless the diameter since there are different types of insulin pens in the market.

The 3D printing process was fully explained week3.

Project Electronics & Power Management

4- Describe your electronic circuit. What are the input and action components? What is the function of each? How do the components integrate together to form your smart system? (List the softwares/tools/components...etc that you used)

I used the same circuit as in week 7 assignment, the only thing I added here was the RTC (real time module) in order to get the time and 2 limit switches.

There is no difference in wiring diagram from the one in week7,

The only difference is the RTC module wiring and I have created a diagram for the wiring of the RTC with the LCD (Sorry for this spaghetti view it is not my normal thing in wiring simulation).

My circuit has 4 inputs (LM35) temperature sensor, pushbutton and 2 limit switches.

1) The temperature sensor reads the temperature and based the temperature the following actions will be done:

  • Buzzer will be turned on will little sound if between 25 and 30 and with maximum level if above 30C.

2) Limit switch when not pressed the following actions will happen:

  • The RTC will detect and saves the time.

3) Pushbutton when pressed the following actions will happen.

  • The LCD will turn on.

  • The time since last time I used my insulin pens is shown on the LCD.

  • The LCD will turn off after 5 seconds.

All tools used in this project explained in week8

VID_20220320_131358.mp4

5- What is your power source? How did you select the suitable power source for your project? (List the softwares/tools/components...etc that you used)

I used 9 V adaptor to power the circuit.

However all my components works with 5V adaptor I decided to use 9V 2 A adaptor in order to make sure every component receives the required voltage and ampere to do the required function.

Project Programming

6- Describe the code of your project. How did you program each function of the project?

Code and programming concepts was described in details in week8 except the RTC code part.

Since this was the first time for me to use RTC I read more about it before beginning from this site.

In order to get the time I programmed my code to digital read of the limit switch.

I started my code by setting the limit switch as int.

Since I use 2 limit switches I named it with limit switch 1 and limit switch 2.

In the setup part I set pin mode for limit switch as input in order to get the reading from it.

In the loop part I added if condition to read the state of the limit switch if it reads high it will save the current time for this limit switch.

For the RTC, I first installed library called RTCLIB to be able to use the RTC.

Before starting I set the current time and date of the RTC as guided here.

Then in the program I included the library, named my RTC and set 2 variables called mytime 1 and mytime 2 to store the time value for every pen separately using data type called DataTime.

In the setup part I initiated the RTC.

In the loop part I set the RTC to detect the time once the limit switch turns high.

Project Integration & Testing

7- Demonstrate with text and visuals how did you integrate the project’s modules together? What are the testing results? (Include a Demo video separately, showing a proof of functionality)

I first tested the circuit separately and the enclosure without any electronic components included in order to trace issues before the integration process.

After confirming that all clear I started the integration by assembling the Arduino first with its related part and started the wiring following wiring code of black for ground and red for positive then I attached remaining parts as shown below.

VID_20220323_034747.mp4

Sharing & Collaboration

8- Did you ask for feedback? What are the ideas that others have contributed or suggested? What was someone else’s idea that you built upon? How did you help your peers? How did your peers help you?

I asked for feedback many times from Nada and Ahmed (my instructors) since I have little experience with design and I changed my design a lot due to this.

For example the first design was 3d printed box, then Nada suggested that I need to make 2 levels box first level for electronic components and second one of the insulin pen holding so, if any issue happened to the wiring (happened actually during fabrication) I can de-assemble the pen holder part, fix the issue and assemble it again.

I really want to thank them, because of them my project became true not just idea in my mind.

Idea of using limit switch to get the time was one of their ideas.

Thanks to Anas my as he suggested the idea to attached breadboard to the design using double face and as extra step I can use glue gun to attach the double face and make it stronger.

I also contributed to Anas's idea by suggesting to use if condition in his project to change the state if the limit switch state in his project changed during the running of the code.

Overcoming Challenges

9- When you got stuck, what/who did you turn to? At what point did you have to pause to research or learn more before moving on? What are some mistakes, pitfalls, or challenges that others can avoid if they were doing this project?

There was bad luck here don't know why :D.

A lot of issues appeared due to lack of experience.

For example in my code I used int to get the date instead of using DateTime function.

I asked on the slack channel and thanks to Mohamed Tarek I managed to correct it.

Design dimensions was very big issue for me, I wanted to add LED, I added its place in the design but I added the place in very low level and I forgot to take the breadboard dimension into consideration and I ended up leaving the hole empty as I was having no time to re-fabricate this part (1st photo).

The LED holes needs to be in the mid of the design not at the bottom.

Another thing is the limit switch place and rubber band place.

Both were smaller by around 1.5 mm than the actual dimension and in order to over come this I used cutter and screws driver to make the holes bigger.

Photos for the before and after using the cutter and screws driver to correct the dimensions issue (2nd and 3rd photos).

Future Work

10- If you had more time, what is one thing you would change/ Do next in your project?

Making better design (since the design is very simple) and re-design if needed if any issue appeared instead of using something to make bigger holes manually.

Make box cover with close and open mechanism.

Add code part to remind me if I didn't take insulin for long time.

Adding Bluetooth module and design mobile app to receive the reading on my mobile.

Adding battery to be able to use the box anytime without using power adaptor.

Final Project Design Files

Design files can be found here.