San Diego

Tech Fest, August 2008

An Event to Showcase Electronic's Students Projects

On 23 August, 2008 the school held a Tech-Fest to give electronics students an opportunity to display and compete with their electronic creations. Here are some photos of the participants and their creations. Since I neglected to ask any students for their permission to publish these photos, students are not identified. If you wish your name or any other information to be posted here about you, please email me.

Second Place, Best 6th and 7th Quarter Project

This Fibonacci Counter is based on the famous Fibonacci sequence that goes 0, 1, 1, 2, 3 and so on, with each next number being the sum of the previous two numbers. Computations were made in binary using the assembly language of the Motorola 68HC11 microprocessor. Numbers were then converted to decimal.

Here are the proud builders of the Fibonacci computer.

Microcontroller Stepper Motor Project

IT WORKS!!! Says a student who gets his computer to control the speed of a stepper motor.

The Allen-Bradley Programmable Logic Controller

Here the PLC is being programmed to run an assembly line that senses a container and then dispenses a product to fill the container.

Basic Atom Pro

The Atom Pro chip and programming language is used here to program a sumo robot.

Major Surgery!

This sumo robot suffers a massive failure and never recovers in time for the contest.

Light Following Robot

This late entry was up and running in time for the fans to see it follow a light around the room.

Running the Test Track

This line-follower goes through its paces in the test arena.

And the Winner Is!!!!!

This line-follower took top honors and the trophy for the "Best Project 6th and 7th Quarters.

 Here are the proud line-following robot winners.

The judges later confided that the final deliberations were intense, but the excellent documantation and the superb, clear and well thought out 'Project Presentation' to the judges put them over the top in the contest.

The Bachelor's Program Winners

These students created a complete climate control system with operational heating and air conditioning systems that could be entirely controlled remotely from a personal computer.

Mini-Sumo Robots

There were no mini-sumo robots registered at the middle of the semester, but the robot fever caught on, and three mini-sumo robots appeared in the last few weeks.

The Line-Up

The three mini-sumo robots line up for a photo op.

Maxi-Sumo Contest

The main contest followed the standard Sumo Rules for the 3 kilogram (6.6 pounds) class used in the US and Japan. This second place finisher, looking like the Borg mother ship on Star-Trek, surprised everyone when it gave the heavy favorite a run for the money!

The Winners at Work

Here the sumo robot contest winners tune up their computer program.

THE WINNER!!

The Sumo on the left took the prize with a "best two out of three" contest.