For my first project I was assigned to build a traffic light, a relatively simple project but complex for someone who knows nothing about how to code. My struggles were mainly software related as I had to learn the fundamentals about coding and the language. After I made a functioning traffic light that cycled through green, yellow, and red, I then had to install a pedestrian button that would interrupt the cycle and turn the lights to red. It took a bit of time for me to fully comprehend what all had to fully go into programming the button to change the cycle.
Once I figured it out and made a functional traffic light with a pedestrian button I was then tasked to construct a motorized pinwheel. Which was also a relatively simple project, I didn’t face many problems completing this project it was pretty straight forward. After I understood how to spin a motor going one direction, I then had to make a motor that could spin both forwards and backwards and change the speed. This project is where I spent most of days doing. Initially the problem was with the H-bridge (a component that enables the user to hold large circuit within one component). So I had to switch it with another H-bridge, then the button that changed the direction of the motor was not working and, after some testing I realized the problem relied within the hardware and upon more investigation found out that one of the pins on the second H-bridge was not working so the rest of the circuit was not getting the information the button was being pressed. The thankfully, the H-bridge has two sides that are separate from each other, meaning that I was able to switch all the wires on the broken side and move them to a side where it was working. After I made that change my circuit worked and the motor was changing directions.
After completing that circuit, I then made a project that was much simpler than the previous. I made a simple Servo circuit, which pretty much just made a motor spin at specific degrees. Then made it turn similar to a windshield wiper which ranged from 20 degrees to 160 degrees (because motors can’t really spin all the way to 0 and 180 otherwise they spaz out).
