Mouse Droid Blog

This week's progress centered around updating our current simulation model to fit the physical models Ackermann Steering method. Progress this week was not major as many attempts to reconfigure the front wheels for more accurate steering were made, with advancements appearing near the end. We are continuing the development of the simulations Ackermann Steering and from there will begin programming a set path for the robot to move, additionally, the controller for the simulation may have to be updated to work with the new steering. The total hours logged for this week: 20 hours. Below are images and videos documenting our progress: Fig 1. Front Axle Testing Fig 2. Applying forces to the robot Fig 3. More forces

 This week's progress centered around updating the droid's simulated dimensions. Accuracy is integral in creating as realistic an environment as possible to minimize any hiccups in the ultimate transition from the simulation to the actual droid itself. Droid specs were acquired from MEs and reflected in our updated code. A new GitHub repository was also created, due to technical difficulties with parent folder permissions with our previous directory. Gazebo was successfully installed and now runs smoothly, the team also created a shortcut/wrapper file to run repetitive launch commands more efficiently. Motion tests were conducted in Gazebo as well, the droid now can move in a simulated environment using keyboard commands as input. The current challenges at this stage are as follows: The simulated droid currently in development only moves using it's back two tires (for forward/backward/turning) and pushes "frictionless" front tires that do not turn. In addition to

The week's progress focused on starting to run the simulation on the desktop. Having gotten the existing files connected to the GitHub repository we were able to edit some of the dimensions to fit sizes we found online as a placeholder until the other team gave us the final sizes. All was working well, however once we moved to the desktop and input the commands to start up the simulation process we ran into errors not yet seen and spent the rest of the time trying to fix them. Eventually the issues were fixed and we were able to run the simulation for the first time only to realize the dimensions were in the wrong order and we had to fix them. Other tasks for the week include continuing the playlist and likely making a new repository as the working files aren't linked to GitHub. The total time spent working this week was 18 hours. Below are this weeks images: Fig. 1 Directory Issues Fig. 2 Commands to start simulation Fig. 3 Simulation model with wrong dimensions Fig. 4 Simulat