Steering Inspiration in the right direction

 Big things have been going on over here in the past month. Cristin and I (and no part of Stray Robotics) have been accepted into a fantastic and elite group of volunteers, The JPL Solar System Ambassadors. We, as individuals, can now go to schools and public events and discuss topics in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM) or anything else JPL might like us to participate in. As an example, Cristin and another ambassador will be talking about Hubble at the Minneapolis Science Museum later in April. I have also taken a new job as an Engineer at a great company, so no more assembly or machine running type work for me. I get to finally put my Bachelor's and new electronics degree to good use! So a little inspirational tip for you timid folk like me, if you see a job you think you'd be good at but feel you don't have the qualifications for, go ahead and apply for it! You might be surprised by the people who interview you and find you have some great things in common. If you're a pleasant person and excited just to be there, they might be willing to train you. And chances are, you'll find people that think you'd be good at it too. 

 That brings me to the whole point of this project and this blog, which is to inspire everyone to "Go Forth and Be Brilliant", as +Cristin always tells me. What I try to do at the various places we show Inspiration is to inspire people, no matter how old they are, to pursue their dreams. Find that childhood dream that got lost during the course of growing up and go get it! It was your dream for a reason and I'm willing to bet that life will become much more interesting and rewarding once you start on that journey. I could go on about my life changing experiences since pursuing my childhood dream but I think that would be best shared elsewhere. And of course, feel free to share your stories in the comments or message me. 

 Now lets get back to the progress. We had a great meeting a few weeks ago with Donald (the LabView genius) and he's come up with a great way to retrieve specific information, that I can make constantly streaming from Inspiration, and turn it into wonderful gauges on the control panel. Gauges like battery level, internal temperature, servo positions, and anything else we want to monitor. He also figured out a way to grab the GPS data and use it in a Google Maps window to guide Inspiration to anywhere on the map. Very exciting stuff that is mostly waiting for the parts that I'm working on. Which is:

 Steering. After noticing how terrible Inspiration turns on high traction surfaces, I've decided to make the corner wheels turn to make rotation a lot easier. This also makes Donald's GPS guidance system work a lot better since Inspiration won't have to be moving first in order to turn towards a way point. This also gives it about 4 more inches of ground clearance which was desperately needed since Inspiration couldn't even clear small rocks without getting caught on them. (The next Jenga block test with suspension was a miserable failure too and I probably didn't share that video... or even took the video.)

 Speaking of videos! Here is a time lapse video of one of the steering brackets being printed on our 3D printer. 

  This was actually the second attempt because I'm still trying to figure out how to keep the material from peeling off of the bed during a print. The first attempt got about 1/3 of the way and then started to peel up so badly that it popped itself loose. I still have some techniques to learn yet before I print any more parts. But here is the finished bracket with the servos and wheel mounted on it:

 

 I then decided that it was unnecessarily bulky and that it could lose some size and weight and add a little more ground clearance by taking off the useless tray that the drive servo was sitting on. I also shaved off some of the excess material in the middle of the bracket, making it look more streamlined. You can see the bracket changes I've made on this next picture (which, now that I look at it, I could have brought the ground up a little higher so it doesn't look so funny.)

 I was also forced to bring the shoulder joints out farther because the drive servos stick out a bit and would hit the body during any kind of suspension movement. So Inspiration now has a wider stance too which could probably come in handy. But it also means that I'll need to make the rocket a little bigger too. So far it looks like the rocket might be about 10 to 12 inches in diameter and that would make it roughly 8 feet tall if I try to keep it in proportion. But that's a much later problem to deal with. 

 Right now, the focus is on steering and a new suspension that goes with the new brackets. Then the best part, test driving! So stay tuned and share some stories or ask some questions in the comments. And remember to Go Forth and Be Brilliant!