Reporting from the cabin 2

 

The meeting was an opportunity to put some plans and dates in place, so we know what dates we need to get things working by, ready for testing, and of course ready for videoing.

1. Finish research and agree approach by end of January

2. Complete robot component design by end of February

3. Complete robot construction by end of May

4. Complete testing and ready for video for end of June.

Seems plenty of time but then we all have other projects we're working on.

Having made some sheep, we played around with how we could gather them in and move them about, mainly with a few bits of wood and patting the cardboard about, and found we could get quite a lot done that way. Scaling this up to a practical robot attachment we got an idea we could make and test.

This is very much in keeping with what we can make so prototypes will be constructed to try out for next time.

In keeping with the Shepherds Pi challenge, we've also acquired a whistle and microphone for issuing commands to 'rover', so it's likely a fair bit of annoyance will be caused with loud whistles for testing.

And just to keep the theme going, a shepherds crook which might form part of a gate opener and sheep prodder when we have a better idea of what is needed there.

In a previous blog, we had pictures of the cattle feeding hoppers in design and now they have become reality, though still in need of a connecting bracket to the mounting plate. 

We still need to make a funnel to direct the feed sideways to the trough, but this part is well underway for having it's first solution. A second solution is not out of the question if it's better. Quite obviously we need a cable management solution to!

That's it for now,  a break until the new year though I'm sure we'll all have designed or made something in between, and videos of mass hopper emptying as well sheep herders to look forward to. We'll stop using the pretty yellow and green plastic as well, looks too good for prototypes so back to more boring colours, we'll bring them out again for final construction.