As it was the first week, this week the group chose the project we were going to pursue. The decision was to create a solar powered battery pack for two reasons. One is that the theme of the lab is sustainable energy and the other was the group wanted something that would be able to help people. In areas, where there is a lot of sun, but very little access to power electronics still need to be charged. These battery packs would be able to charge phones, or other small electronics in case of an emergency.
Week 2:
After sitting on this project idea for one week, some modifications to the original design were made. When researching solar energy, the results showed that solar energy was readily available, but it was not very efficient to collect. Solar panels have a limited surface area where they can capture that energy and the photons not collected were lost. Our solution is to use a lens to concentrate the energy onto the solar panel. After continuing to read, it became apparent that the solar panel could be positioned on a platform and controlled to "follow" the sun. By using an arduino and data from an outside source tracking the sun's position in a specific area, the solar panel could be angled throughout the day to capture the strongest sunlight possible.
Week 3:
The parts necessary to build this device were ordered. The plan is to create a design and then modify it so that when the parts are in, everything is ready to go. This allows more time to be spent making small adjustments to the design when the parts are in. This also means the amount of time to test the device should be increased because everything should be ready. As far as things that were ordered, an arduino board, two solar panels, different types of wire and various glassware was ordered. This was done early, again, in the event that something else was necessary for the project, there would be time to make an alterations in the plan if need be.
Week 4:
Parts arrived and the building of a working prototype began. A 3D model of the frame to hold the servos in place as well to hold the concave mirror and solar panel was designed to be printed. The design was modified several times during the course of the week.
Week 5:
The prototype was finally assembled, however, it failed to function. A few changes were made to the design to correct the faults. The distance between the mirror and solar panel were adjusted. Testing will be done soon to determine whether the new design worked. The wireless charging system was also setup but the transistor blew in the process of testing and so a better design is being considered.
Week 6:
Modifications were made in the code of the arduino utilizing the Arduino Software and are still being made. In addition, the physical aspect of the the device was very close to being finalized. However, although the two seem to work by themselves, the combination of the two to work together still needs to be worked on.
Week 7:
The code is still being modified as we continue to modify the prototype. The next step will be to put both the hard and soft ware together to see if they match. First, the code will need to be changed according to the specifications of the completed mechanical design.
Circuits:
This a collection of all our proposed circuit designs.
This first design was the original design of the connection flow. This was essentially a flow chart for how the energy in the system would flow and wasn't veyr formally made. It allowed the group to see how the circuit would be set up. It was used for determining how the resistance and current would have to be resitricted in order not to blow out any parts.
The second design is a list of the parts we needed to add into the system in order not to blow out any parts. There had to be a balance between the resistance of the arduino and the solar panels, but a balance of current between the servos and the solar panels. The solar panels used were changed to allow for more of a range in the specifications allowed for the system.
The third design is the plan for how the breadboard will be connected to the arduino so that it functions properly. Resistors must also be added to the breadboard circuit so that the solar panels will not be destroyed by having too much power sent to them at one time. The design pictured here has the resistors attached to pins 6 and 7 of the arduino as those are the pins that servos are attached to. The servos also have a limited range of values where they will not be blown out so that is also taken into account here.
The fourth design is the values for each of the parts and how much resistance we will have to add into the circuit for each section. These resistors are going to protect the circuit from overpowering these parts and will help to keep all the parts in the required range.
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