Documentation (Innovative simple interesting)

Planning & Brainstorming

The plan for the project was something simple. I thought of the idea for a fan. The tensegrity was supposed to be a lot more complicated

Kawn offered a more simpler tensegrity so we went with this one

Circuit

Process

Original code

We went through a bunch of versions before we landed on one

1. Materials Used

• Paper straw,
• Scotch tape
• Wood, paper, cardboard, toothpicks, glue, etc.
• Crafting tools and supplies
• Servo motor or DC hobby gear motor(s)
• BBC microBit
• LDR modules (light sensor module)
• TIP 120 Darlington Transistors
• Breakout boards (DFRobot MicroMate)
• External white LEDs (optional)
• Recycled materials

• Description: The ISI is just a simple tensegrity structure that would just spin.
• Functionality: The project reacts to light, the more light there is the faster it spins and vice versa.

Self evaluation

• Title of the work
  • Title: ISI (Innovative simple Interesting) Project. We used cardboard box, strings, wood, tape and toothpicks. We wanted a tensegrity that would fit to look like a fan.
• How creative or unique is your piece?
  •  I think the structure and the way it functions is unique
• How functional is your piece?
  • It functions as intended, except for the fact that the motor and the speed nearly gave us trouble since it was not stable enough.
• How much effort did you put into coding?
  • We took some time on the code but it was a cake walk from there.
• How aesthetically successful is your piece?
  • We put a lot of effort on the tensegrity and we are happy about our structure. On the other hand, we could’ve made our project look nice but it didn’t really concern us that much.
• How well constructed is you piece?
  • Our tensegrity is somewhat well done and the rest of our project looks okay.
• Your favorite aspect of the piece and why it works well for you.
  • The tensegrity itself was my favorite part of the project
• What hurdles did you overcome and how?
  • We were worried about if we could find the right size and tensegrity that we wanted but in the end we found it. Making the structure took a long time but it was fun.
• Suggestions for improvement and how you would implement them.
  • To improve the project i think that we would make the structure a bit more stable, and maybe we could look for a better way to attach the piece to the motor
• Key learnings from the creative process.
  • We learned that we should prioritize the structure first and if its doable rather than just being ambitious and impulsive.
• Number of hours spent working on each components
  • Code and circuit: 30min give or take.
  • Tensegrity: 6 hours spaced out in 2 weeks.