Open Ended Robotic Design For Enhanced Capstone Experience

This paper elaborates on the capstone experiences in the Technology Program of the Technological Studies Department at Ohio Northern University. Students from different levels participate in RI/SME (Robotics International Association of the Society of Mechanical Engineers) Student Robotic Technology and Engineering Challenge, work for two consecutive quarters and earn TECH 435 – Advanced Robotics/Automation and TECH 495 – Senior Project credit. The successful student projects have well represented the program with at least one first place finish since 1993. While most of the projects completed at Ohio Northern University focused on fixed goal problem solving, such as stair climbing or sumo wrestling, the rest were open-ended designs intended for the Robot Construction segment of the competition. Robot Construction is an important segment of the competition leading to design and construction of robots with minimal restraints like safety. ONU robot construction projects included industrially applicable robots, like a gantry (Cartesian) robot and entertainment robots, such as a PLC (Programmable Logic Controller) controlled baseball batter. A new initiative has been launched to improve the robotics program at the Technological Studies Department and to add fun and creativity components to bring more student excitement and higher learning [1]. It will also complement a pure teaching department with a research component through the involvement of state-of-the-art technologies. Animatronics was chosen as the main area of focus. Animatronics is the art of bringing inanimate objects to life through computer, cable, remote, radio controls and puppetry [2] as defined by Jim Henson. From a technical point of view, an animatronic is a figure that is animated by means of electromechanical or mechatronic devices. Its goal is to emulate an actual living being or a fictitious character to entertain. Animatronics will transform the capstone projects from an inter-disciplinary mechatronic design experience to a crossdisciplinary experience with the addition of topics such as biomechanics and artistic design for creativity. Another new addition is the use of microcontrollers in a PLC dominant program. As an initial attempt, an animatronic polar bear, the mascot of Ohio Northern University was created for the 2003 RI/SME competition.