Reverting to original design

I have changed my mind about the location of the engine again. I am placing it under the body, like I was originally planning on doing. There should be plenty of space under the car, and if the batteries are placed towards the back, the weight will be centralised in the correct location anyway.

Change to design

I have decided to place the engine on top of the car, with the batteries angled on top of that. This is because the engine would have to be quite far forward in order to match the cogs if it were underneath, and this could make the car more unbalanced. I think it would be more important to have the car less aerodynamic but more balanced, than unbalanced and aerodynamic.

I have also progressed further in the creation of my car. I have attached the large cog and wheels to my car. It goes almost perfectly straight, leaning a very slight amount to the right, but not enough that I bothered fixing it. An image of my car so far can be seen below.

Starting making my design

So far we have had a couple of lessons on designing/making our cars. I have made the body of it and attached two thin pieces of wood to the base of this to give more support to the plastic for the wheels when I attach it. I changed the body of the car so that it is curved on the front. This was done to make it more aerodynamic and an easier shape to attach the barrier at the front to.

In the next lessons I am going to attach the wheels and make sure that it goes straight, before attaching the cogs and gluing on the engine, batteries and switch.

Ideation

In class today I designed the first cart that I am going to make. The body is going to be made of coreflute, so it will be very thin and light. The motor is going to be placed under the body to make it more aerodynamic. The batteries will be placed near the back of the car to keep the weight centralised slightly in front of the back wheels. A scale drawing of the design can be seen below.

I am thinking about making a later design for my cart using ProDesktop, because then I can get the measurements more exact and the materials will be lighter. I would be able to extrude two holes through the body for the metal pole that the wheels are on, and this would be perfectly straight. I am not sure of what design I would use for this yet, or if I will even have time, but I would like to be able to at least try it.

Theory Lessons - Things to keep in mind

Design tips:
-Lubricant on copper wire at the front and back of the cart, as well as on the metal that the wheels are attached to.
-Weight centralised just in front of the wheels
-Piece of plastic in front to divert the air more smoothly, making the cart more aerodynamic
-Make the cart as light as possible, but not so light that it would flip.
-Thinner body of cart is faster -By changing the positions of the large and small cogs, the cart can either have fast acceleration with a slower top speed or slow acceleration with a very fast top speed.
-Taking the outer layer as well as the silver piece of the wheel helps.
-Higher quality batteries can help slightly

Torch Completion

I have just finished making my torch and am quite pleased with how it turned out. I brought a laptop home tonight and was fiddling with the program, changing little things in the design until I was satisfied. I made each part of the torch several times, each with a small detail changed in it until I decided on the one that I liked the best. For instance, in the barrel of the torch, I made it with the helixes both extruded subtracting material and adding material, and also played with the diameter of each helix. I did similar things with the other parts, but in the end decided to keep them fairly simple because the barrel was already rather complex. With the top cap, I changed it slightly from my original design, adding a small lip at the top to form a small amount of protection around the glass that would cover the reflector.

I am going to try to take home a laptop again on Thursday or over the weekend so that I can make any final adjustments to my design, make the engineering drawing and print out all of the components. I am also planning on beginning work on the written component tomorrow. I have planned out in my head what I want to include in all the different aspects of it, so hopefully it won't take too long.

Also, I am very excited for our next unit of work! I have been looking forward to it ever since it was first mentioned. I have a very competitive nature, and due to this I will probably put a lot more effort into the task than is necessary, but will certainly have a lot of fun while doing it. I am aiming to be able to beat Mr Ward's time, even though I know it is fairly unlikely.

Torch Design Decision

I have settled on a design for my torch. It will be a generic torch shape with spirals around the barrel of it. I am not sure if it will be possible to have multiple spirals crossing over each other yet, so I will try it and if it doesn't work I'll just have one. I haven't done a spiral before, but I found an exercise in the textbook, using the sweep tool, that is fairly similar to what I want to do, so I can modify it to fit my needs. The spirals, while adding interest to the barrel of the torch, will also provide a more rough surface, thus causing more friction between a hand and the barrel. This will make it easier to hold on to than a smooth surface, making it more effective for protection.

The end cap is square, with straight, relatively sharp edges. During a potential attack, these could be used for self defense, while not putting the user at risk. The top cap and reflector are similar in design to other torches.

A scale drawing of my design can be seen below: