Mini-Project 1: Critique

Critique didn't go super well for me. I had some major malfunctions with both the box and the circuitry, and the servo ended up not being able to open the book.

I think one of the big reasons for this was that I compromised on some of my cuts for the plywood. Instead of cutting the 1.25" divot that I calculated, I cut straight across from 3.75" to 2.25". This meant that the space under the top board was too large, and I ended up balancing the Arduino and breadboard on a stack of Post-Its. It fell off regularly during critique, and wires were knocked loose as well.

The other issue was that I only tested if the servo could lift the cover of the book, which it could. But in Critique, it needed to lift the cover plus half the book's pages, which was too much for it. The other thing that didn't help was how sloppily I mounted the servo, which was duct-taped to the interior of the box.

Finally, the box partially fell apart. I glued it together originally, but broke one of the sides off the morning of critique, and had to tape it back on. The tape betrayed me during critique.

Overall, this was a major learning experience, and I hope to not make the same mistakes for the second mini-project.