Week 1

Now that the new spring term has arrived, it is time for us freshmen to tackle our Design Project. Five of us (along with an advisor) were able to form a group that consisted of electrical, mechanical, and computer engineers. Our Design Project’s main objective is to install components into a derelict submarine that would make it controllable by use of an Xbox 360™ controller. The main component we are planning to use is the Arduino microcontroller. It may sound simple, but a lot of programming is involved. Since our first week was basically an initiation to the concept, not a lot of work was done on the actual submarine.

Our main focus for this week was to simply set our goals for each subsequent week and buy the necessities for our project. As of right now, programming this device is difficult as we must first learn how this submarine was meant to be used and incorporate this knowledge to our needs. The first step to doing this was to simply open the “capsule.” This was difficult at first as there were no entry points besides at one end, which was sealed with silicone. After a moment’s indecision, it was decided that the silicone would have to be broken. By using a wrench, one of our group members was able to prey the “capsule” open, which allowed us to take a look at the sub’s internal mechanisms.