We began this week by breaking down the recycled desks and compiling them into piles of stock tubing. We did this by using an angle grinder and cut-off wheel, the whole process took several hours. Next we found a place to work and build our ATV, D-Lab. we talked with Dan, the acting shop head, he liked the project and got us started right away. Me and Raiphy both received welding training, on the MIG welder, and began welding our frame according to the CAD. This was my first time welding, so forgive me on some of the trash welds. We were also given access to a cold-saw which is exceptional at cutting our tubing at perfect angles. It is worth noting that for each weld we had to clear the paint off each peice of tubing this took about 20 mins for each piece of tubing.

For this week we continued to work on the frame. Each day cutting our stock and shaping it into pieces for the frame. I devised a way to keep track of which things needed to be cut and assembled for each frame. I came up with a google spreadsheet and broke each weld/weld group into categories. I labelled them in the CAD so both me and Raiphy could see and work on them independently. In hindsight this was an important and very beneficial step. It helped track progress and made things easier to work on. This week and last we completed weld groups 1-4 and

This week we continued our work on the frame completing weld group 5, 6, and 7. These took a long time because it had awkward angles and was quite long so it took a while to get rid of the paint. We also started cutting and shaping tubing for the 6 and 7th weld group. From this point forward when referencing cutting I am referring to a rough cut made with the cold saw for both length and general angle of each tube end. Similarly, when talking about shaping I am referring to the process of removing paint and cleaning up the edges of each tub with a file, preparing it to be MIG welded.

For this week we finished off our work on the main weld groups (1-8), completing the main sections of our frame. We began working on the bridges. The bridges add more rigidity to the frame. Bridges are single pieces of tubing that connect between weld groups. This is in contrast to the weld groups which make continuous connections.

Upon further inspection of our frame closer to where our suspension mounts we decided it would be best if we reinforced the area with solid round tubing we found in D-Lab. Raiphy did most of the work for this. While I worked on other weld groups. This was one of our more gruelling tasks it required a lot of effort. Hats off to Raiphy for doing this. I worked on cutting and shaping more bridges for adding to our frame.

For this week we completed our frame. We managed to hustle and get the Frame fully complete it weighed in at about 50 ibs (~25kg). Later in the week we divided up the next tasks, and decided to set a goal of having a rolling ATV assembly by Thanksgiving. Raiphy was in charge of assembling the front suspension arms and I will be in charge of assembling the rear suspension arms, which contained more welds.

Because I wanted more welding practice, I decided to cut, shape, and weld this assembly myself. For the first part of the week I spent each day cutting and shaping each piece of tubing to almost the exact specifications in the CAD. I was able to compete almost all the welds for the rear suspension arm.

The main thing I did this week, while Raiphy worked on the front suspension, was continue my work on the Audio amplifier from week 7. I want to be able to drive this ATV and play music. I managed to do some testing on a breadboard and settled on a configuration for the Audio Amplifier I liked. using 2 LM386's and some filters with feedback I was able to make a bridged configuration that seemed to outperform the LM4781 Audio Amplifier IC. I also water-jetted our suspension arm mounts.

The highlight of this week was Raiphy completing the front suspension arm main bodies. we still needed to add stuff for each the rear and front however we were at a point were welding based on the CAD deviated too much from real life. So we decided to wait until we were ready to assemble the rolling chasis before finished off the welds. Also at this point me and Raiphy were extremely comfortable working with Steal and MIG welding, our productivity was beginning to increase dramatically.

In order to meet our deadline we needed to assemble our rolling Chasis. For this we needed threaded rods I made a trip to home-depot and got 1/2" threaded rods with appropriate nuts. I also purchased some small nuts and any other things we might need. We spent alost each day of the week at shop. We finished off any welds we needed for the Rear and Front Suspension arms. We hustled and worked late into the evening, we managed to assemble our chasis and it rolled. We met our first deadline.

After meeting our first deadline, I felt reassured on the trajectory of the project, gaining even more confidence that week we would indeed meet our goals. For this week I played around with CAN, exploring whether it would be feasible to integrate all the circuitry into a CAN-bus. This was largely successful (see week 11 and 12). I also started work on assembling our steering. I managed to water-jet a plate that gets welded to the frame in front. Again this was designed in a very simple so as to not take too much time to assemble.

This is where things are starting to get super improvised. For this week I started by finding a steering handle. I was able to find a handle bar and the mount to along with it from a recycled barbie bike. I took the mount to the sand-blaster to remove the pink paint from it, for later welding. I did the same with the handle bar however it was taking too long so I stopped. After sand blasting I did some machining on the lathe to get the steering attachment that came with the go-kart steering to fit into the bearing. Then I started mounting it too the frame. At the same time Raiphy began to integrate the battery and Motor Controller.

This week had the biggest highs and the biggest lows. Once we got it finally moving we discovered several nearly fatal issues. First I learned the hard way that if there are aren't enough constraints to match the degrees of freedom something breaks, if something is used in an unintended way it breaks, and finally always do your math before you make it. With that in mind I can explain what happened during this week.

First we discovered that our steering was not able to handle the forces on it due to the weight of the vehicle and the torque applied by the handle bars. These forces caused the pinion gear, in the rack and pinion assembly, from the steering assembly to come off. This then caused the front tires to lock out become and misaligned the handle bars. So straight on bars no longer became straight on the road.

The next problem we discovered was that we didn't have enough torque to drive the ATV through a turn (when the steering was working) or go around on the road. This was seemingly a fatal problem as the only solution was to redesign the transmission, and somehow machine it to fit on the current assembly, an almost impossible task.

At this point all hope seemed lost, however after a pick me up from my brother, Raiphy Jerez. I mustered up some energy and looked at the CAD for the transmission, after staring at it for a while I came up with a solution, it would be a pain to assemble but it would work. I came up with a way to mount another reduction stage, by taking advantage of our current motor plate which had been welded, in our Raiphy worked on solving the steering problem. He delivered spectacularly. We were able to work together and fixed minor issues that came up with either of our solutions. Within 48 hours our project went from barely drivable to smooth riding.

Once we go through this hurdle it was time to integrate our main Electronics additions we had been working on over the weeks. I redesigned my speaker boards from the previous weeks to be more modular and robust. I made an amplifier board for each speaker and an input board which handles volume and aux input as well as a mixing channel for the wave-form display. I milled out the boards designed a case for the speaker and panel for all of Raiphy's additions. We managed to integrate everything with the exception of the wave form display.