Monday, April 11, 2011

Robopro Marble Sorter


Brainstorming ideas:
























Decision Matrix:



Final Decision Solution:



















The marble wouold travel down and get sorted on the track by either colored marble or wooden/metallic. Then each marble would get subsorded according to either color for the glass marbles or metallic/non-metallic for the wooden and metal marbles.


Design Modifications:






















We got rid of the track for the marble to go on since the marbles kept falling off. And we added a wheel so the marble could be rotated into the correct bin.



Final Design:



















One marble would get pushed down one at a time. If the marble was small, it would go straight down. If not, then it would roll to the right until it hits the light sensor. The small marbles would get sorted by either metallic or wooden by the magnet. The wooden marbles would roll right through into their associated bin and the metallic marbles would catch onto the magnet, waiting to get pushed by the motor. When the bigger colored marbles travel over to the light sensor, it detects its light sensitivity, releasing the gate to send the associated number with the color and put it in it's correct bin.




Reflection: We accomplished our objectives very well. When we tried making a track for the marble to roll on and then get dropped in the bin, it wasn't working because the marble kept rolling off of it before it was to get pushed inside the correct bin. Our final results were a lot better than what we came up with before. The wheel allowed each marble to fall into the correct bin without falling out. And our magnet allowed us to detect the metallic marbles apart from the wooden marble. We couldn't get the starting motor to work so