8/24/16
On the first day of robotics, the class was split into two groups. One group was with Dr. Neato, and the other one was with Mr. Miller. I went with Mr. Miller. He taught my group exactly the kinds of things that the class would be doing throughout the year. He also introduced us to some of the tools that we'd be using for stuff like projects and group assignments.
8/9/16On the second day of robotics, the class did a little reversal. The groups swapped teachers, so this time, I was with Dr. Neato. Neato went over some of the projects that we'd be doing throughout the semester. Later on, he made us play an interesting, yet confusing game. It was a sort of memory game where one had to remember the order of the names of the people previous to them in a long ass line. I managed to get all my assigned names correct, so i guess I won the game :). That was all we did in robotics that day.
8/10/16Today, the class had a wednsday challenge to complete. This challenge is a huge one, probably worth a lot of points. students were broken off into groups of 4, and each group had to build spaghetti bridges with a measely 20 sticks of spaghetti and some wood glue. We were also provided with 100 extra pieces of spaghetti, so that we could run some trial bridges. Of course, being the scrub that I am, I had to be assigned a "veteran" group member. His name's Kirk. He's a pretty cool dude, and REALLY smart too. He appears to be a very literal and rational person, but hey, those aren't bad characteristics to have. In fact, I wish I had those sorts of qualities, beacuse I'm REALLY bad at making decisions. Anyways, for today, my group decided on the design we would take on to construct the bridge. Our bridge would consist of 4 pieces of spaghetti with a quarter overlap between each piece. The bridge would be supported with two spaghetti triangles so that it would be able to hold more weight. That's all we did today, but this challenge will span over a range of about 2-3 weeks. During this time period, we'll have 6 class days in total to work on our bridge.
8/11/16Today, we continued to work on the spaghetti bridges. During the time my group had to work, we made some measurements and calculations and decided to use 4 pieces of spaghetti with a quarter overlap. We made a prototype of the bridge and the spaghetti triangles to support it. We haven't put the bridge together yet, but hopefully when we do the whole thing stays in tact. All we could do is pray and cross our fingers.
8/12/16Today, Dr. Neato taught me how to create a webpage with this application called notepad++. We didn't start anything visual though. He just showed us what we had to put to get our site up and running--html, body, head, title, the /'s--all that kind of neat stuff. So, by the end of the class, we all got the setup done for the website. Now all that's left to do is type the paragraphs (though i'm not looking forward to them).
8/15/16Today, the class finally started to type paragraphs for their website. I decided to break all of last week into separate days, don't ask me why I did it that way, I just felt like it :). Soooo, I pretty much tapped into that thinking part in my head and tried to recall all the information I could of last week and what I did in Principles of Engineering. And thus, the monstrosity you see above you was created. It wouldn't be fun to just talk about a website the whole time, so here are some other things I did that day: I played basketball in my front yard. Versed my brother, but he beat me 21-15. It ain't fair though, 'cause he's really REALLY tall, I mean, how am I supposed to stop a 6'4 player? Well, other than having my ass handed to me, I did all the HW I was assigned in other classes (thank God Mr. Neato doesn't assign us anything!) and played some good old fashioned chess on the interweb. That pretty much sums up yesterday. Wish more happened though :(. Hopefully tomorrow--I mean today, since I'm typing all this from the next day XD--will be more eventful.
Today was another Wednesday challenge. The students assembled into their little groups again, and we all continued working on our spaghetti bridge. My group was able to make some more progress: We constructed more spaghetti lines to act as bridges, and the triangles for the bridge turned out perfectly. Now all that's left is to glue all the pieces together and test the protype to see if it could support enough weight for us to at least earn a decent grade.
Today, the class worked on websites again. Basically I did the same thing as I always do for this thing. I typed what I did for the last day--the Wednesday challenge--and then I played some games on the laptop when I was done. Kirk kept stopping me though, wanted me to be productive :(. Didn't work out so well though.
8/19/16On Friday, I hung out with some friends at the Americana. We got juice at this one place called Green Crush-- personally my favorite juice store in the whole Galleria (which is located next to the Americana)--and walked around the area for a little bit. Later, we went to Crescenta Valley to play some basketball. We just balled with each other because the other court already had enough ppl for a full court. It was really fun, even though I did lose both games of 21.
8/20/16On Saturday, I stayed almost the whole day--it was pretty dang boring. During that time, I played some videogames on my Wii U, and I caught up a little on my reading for AP English Lit. I did go out to play some basketball later-- the highlight of my day--and in the night, I rested in my bed and watched a couple episodes of this one show called The Black Butler.
8/21/16On Sunday, I worked on finishing all my homework (or at least as much as I could before my procrastinating instincts kicked in). Like the previous two days, I went later to play basketball, a couple of full court games, and I came home later to work some more. Most of my homework time consisted of reading Heart of Darkness, which is a very confusing book that uses complex diction and utilizes an ominous and dark mood in order to convey the main character's experiences effectively. I like the book so far, but the annotations are a pain in my nogin.
8/22/16Today, the class worked on websites again. We all had to write what we did over the weekend. So I did just that, wrote about my days and all. While we were working on that, this one elder kid named Jacob was getting everyone's website hooked onto the cloud so that we could all access them from our homes. I think he worked on mine too, but it was for about 2 minutes before the class ended, so I'm not sure if him and I were successful in uploading my website.
8/23/16
Today, We worked on websites for a little bit. Afterwards, Mr. Neat showed us how to use a design app that we'd be using in the future to design out skateboards. He didn't show us all the features on the app though, just two of them. We rotated the virtual world and moved it from side to side. I played around a little bit more with the app though, seeing what different buttons caused. I didn't figure out much. All I learned from playing around was how to zoom in and zoom in the app, but hey, worth a shot, right? The app could be easily accessed through Mr. Neat's website, so that's cool.
8/24/16
Today was a wednesday, and you know what that means--Wednesday challenge baby! The groups assembled and got to work on their spaghetti bridges. My group's progress is especially good...well, not really good. It's actually a little iffy, but we did manage to contruct all the parts needed for our prototype bridge. Kirk handled most of the work though, but he is a veteran though. He was just showing us the ropes; teaching us scrubs how to do our jobs. So we glued all the pieces together and waited for the glue to set. After the glue was applied, we the board that the spaghetti bridge was on to the desk at the side of the room that we went to with Mr. Miller to work on the bridge and do stuff with like gluing the spaghetti bridge together so that we could move the board to the desk...........
Spaghetti Bridge Wednesday Challenge Bridge Competition Results 8/26/16Today, we were introduced to a man who makes cameras for hollywood cinemas. Later, the veterans talked to us about the JPL challenge. they had a powerpoint that showed us the different methods that they came up with to complete the challenge efficiently and effectively. However, the methods are NOT final. We still have to test them out to see which one works the best. We also have to figure out what design we're going to use for each method. In my opinion, the funnel idea is the most interesting where an arm picks up the vessel and quickly flips it into the cup. Now, this method is pretty ordinary in itself. What makes it so interesting is the idea of putting a funnel over the cup so that there's no loss of water due to splashback.
href="Sem 1/http://mechconcepts.com/">Mr. Wilton's Website 8/29/16Today, Kirk helped me get onto FileZilla. He created my account and transferred my index into the cloud. He told me that now, I have to type my website on FileZilla, because if I do it on my index alone, my work won't be stored in the cloud and my work can't be viewed by the Neato and da Miller.
Cat And Dog Wednesday Challenge 9/9/16Today, the veterans informed us of their progress on the JPL challenge. Some of the previous concepts suggested before were crossed off due to inefficiency. 3 concepts were left unscathed, but a plethora of other designs were suggested and presented through rough sketches.
9/10/16This Saturday, I went out with friends late in the night. We drove around for a little bit, letting the road take us to wherever and whatever destination it chose to present. I pondered on getting some frozen yogurt at the Froyo store, but then I thought to myself, "what would a healthy person do?" So I said "NAH" to the froyo. Willpower baby.
9/11/16This Sunday, A friend asked me if I wanted to watch his soccer game. I accepted the invitation and arrived at the Sports Complex at 3:30 to see him play. His team lost 2-1, but that's OK, as long as he had a fun time. After the game, we went to Panda Express and ate some chinese food. I returned home after my meal and watched TV for the remaining hours.
9/12/16
Today, the teacher informed us that our grades were posted online and that we could view them. After the teachers gave us that announcement, they told us to go to sketchup. They showed us how to make boxes, and with those boxes, we created a makeshift city.
9/13/16
Today was yet another Wednesday challenge. This time, groups were assigned by the teacher. Our assignment was to craft a block of wood to have as accurate of dimensions as an ordinary block of jenga wood would have. My group had an especially precise outcome and was praised by Mr. Miller :) so yay! We only had enough time to construct one block though, and I think that we're going to continue procedures tomorrow.
Jenga Block Wednesday Challenge 9/15/16Today, we did a rerun of the jenga block wednesday challenge. But this time, we didn't receive any help from the veterans, as they were working on the very important JPL challenge. So my group tried doing it without Connor, our assigned veteran. We used the same tools that he used and followed the same process, but I guess something went wrong because our measurements didn't quite "measure up" :D.
9/16/16Today, the class talked more about the JPL challenge. The veterans showed us their progress so far, and we were able to give our opinions on what we thought of it. They even demonstrated some of their machines using a bunch of cheap tools like cardboard. I was assigned a very important role for this mission--the duty of being both da "stauta" and the "stauppa"--so as you could see, I'm a pretty big deal around here.
9/17/16Today, I went to the beach with the First Baptist Church group. We all had a lot of fun there. We visited the pier, went to the arcade, and a lot more. After, we filled up on funnel cakes and some really choice burgers. Later on, we headed to the beach and played in the water until we had to leave.
9/18/16Today, I went to Manhatten beach with my family and a couple of family friends. Luckily, my friend Bryant came, so I wasn't too bored. We played soccer, volleyball, and swam in the ocean for a little bit. We snacked on pizza and fruit cups and had a lot to drink, like gatorade and pineapple juice. We left around 6:00, and I had to do my HW afterwards. 9/19/16
Today, we created an exact replica--accounting for exact(or at least as exact as we could get) measurements--of a contraption that we each built utilizing 3 jenga blocks in succession of the power of pizza squared to the root of disco funk in the 70's of my mom's apple pie.
9/20/16Today, a person from Skillify talked to us about joining their program. They told us that we'd be able to intern for our dream jobs. The program would also help us with our anxiety and shyness issues that some of us struggle with in the house of the grated cheese steaks crembule of the french mofos to the power of french toast and escargos buffet.
9/21/16Today was a Wednesday challenge. The class was split into two groups. Each group had to work together to get a marble inside of a bag by using and connecting various concave white mechanisms. My team lost, but that's because everyone in the team were a bunch of scrubs. Nah jk, but seriously, wait what am I even talking about? Hold up a sec, Oh Yeah! so basically worked with my team to achieve victory. But we lost. So, in conclosing, none of it matters. Marble Wednesday Challenge
9/22/16Today, the class was taught how to upload a Youtube video for the websites. I uploading the ones I sent to Alex which he uploaded to his website and I copied and pasted his page source info, so now I have videos on my website and that's pretty cool. For the rest of the class period, I worked to include all the requirements for when Mr. Neat grades my work.
9/23/16Today, the class worked on puting the finishing touches on websites. We're working hard to make sure that our blogs meet all the criteria that Dr. Neat has set. For my own website, I worked on adding my wednesday challenge links because I know that those count for a huge part of my grade.
9/24/16Today, I hang out with some friends. We went to this one kickback at this girl's house, and it was pretty cool. We got to hang out and do lots of crazy stuff. I had to leave early though because mom got worried. Overall, I had a really good time. :)
9/25/16 This Sunday, I went to my old church, Antioch Presbytarian Church. It was the first time I went in a while. The company over there wasn't much different. Everything seemed pretty much the same. I struggled with the sermon that Pastor Josh gave though. I didn't particularly like how he analyzed James, Ch. 1, verses 5-8. The verses themselves raised a lot of questions for me, and when I asked the pastor for guidance, he gave me answers that didn't satisfy my curiosity. I think from now on, Ima go to First Baptist Church. I like the ppl over there more and the sermons are a little bit better. 9/26/16Today, Dr. Neat talked to us about our grades. Many ppl, including me, did bad during the website grading because we didn't upload our jpgs or links onto filezilla. Thus, the pictures and links that were supposed to be on our website weren't at all. Ima have to do that later on, but my grade for first quarter is pretty much down the drain. Thank the stars that I could make up for it in second quarter. Yay!
9/27/16
Today, Dr. Neat showed us a step-by-step video analyzing why the Falcon 9 exploded. The video stated that it had something to do with liquid nitrogen. I'm honestly fuzzy with the details. All I know for sure is that the explosion was massive and spectacular, like the Fourth of July, except without all the pretty effects.
9/28/16
Today, we were assigned another Wednesday challenge. After groups were assembled, we were informed of the rules: This time, we are required to build an arch bridge that made with the same building block material and constructed with no adhesives. This is a really important assignment because the students who win this challenge will receive As for the quarter grade. We all have to work hard and persevere.
9/29/16Today, students were put back into their groups to work on the arch bridge. My group made some progress: We decided to tie twizzlers together in order to construct both our arch and our bridge. We have yet to get a design approved by Dr. Neat.
9/30/16Today, we talked about the JPL challenge. The veterans showed us a sketchup of some designs that they had for completing the competition. This included the Kevin Arm, the vacuum idea, and this other one that I can't quite remember. I particularly liked the Kevin Arm because it would be the most accurate way to transport the water and fish into the vessel. The only flaw with this design is that once the arm is stopped by the mechanism's 2by4, the arm may potentially brake from the sheer force applied to both objects by the final speed of the arm as it comes into contact with the 2by4. I was thinking that the team could use a sort of cushion to prevent this from occurring.
10/1/16This Saturday, I went to the YMCA to workout out my biceps and my back. I got sore after a couple sets, so the length of the workout period only lasted about an hour and a half. After, I went to the park with my friends for a little bit. In the night, my family had a little get-together. We cooked up some barbeque and invited some people over. The barbeque was delicious, and we had a lot of fun in between time.
10/2/16 This morning, I went to church and stayed for between 11:00-12:15. The pastor preached to us about blind faith and what it means for a person to possess it. After church, I went to the beach with my mom and dad. I swam, played some volleyball and did all other kinds of fun stuff. I went to CV afterward to play some basketball with my friends. 10/3/16Today, I worked with my group on brainstorming ideas for the arch bridge wednesday challenge. I originally had the idea of using nerd strings to contruct the arch by tying the pieces of candy string together. However, my dreams were quickly crushed by Mr. Neat's declaration that contestants can't tie their building blocks together. My group is really struggling on figuring out what sort of building block we should use, as we can't even stack the pieces on top of each other. So says the almighty teacher Dr. Neat -_-
10/4/16
Today, my group decided to try constructing our arch bridge using jenga blocks. the blocks don't have a surface that would necessarily grip against one another, so figuring out how to construct the blocks into an arch will prove difficult. I personally don't think that this idea will work, but at the moment, I can't think of any other building block that has the same or greater potential than the jenga block. I will continue to brainstorm, possibly consulting other people for clues and ideas.
God shed a light on us today! It turns out that we misunderstood Dr. Neat when he said that we couldn't stack jenga blocks. In reality, we can, but the middle block has to support the structure from collapsing. In other words, In order to legally build the arch, the whole arch has to collapse if the middle component is removed from it. So, we tried the jenga blocks out again, but the surfaces of them weren't grippy enough. Therefore, we have to brainstorm again accounting for both the texture of our building block, since the texture would determine how well the blocks grip against one another.
10/6/16
It's the day of the competition, and my group has decided to use foam blocks to construct the arch. It worked pretty well, but it wasn't long enough that we'd win the competition. I really wanted that A for the quarter too, so that kind of sucks, but at least I didn't get disqualified like in the first Wednesday challenge. Yay! :)
Today was another Wednesday Challenge. This time, we had to build card bridges. The goal of the challenge was to make the card house as high as possible. The teams are not allowed to use any adhesives or bend the cards. My team consisted of Malik and Edgar. Everytime my group attempted to construct the bridge, it always collapsed at one time or another. In the end, we only had three layers to our bridge, resulting in a score of 6.5 inches.
Wednesday Challenge Card Bridge Challenge Of Challenges To The Challengeth Power Of Squared Cards Which Are Mentally Challenged^2
CardBridgeChallenge
This is the card I made in Sketchup. Hooray!!!
Today, the veterans told us of their progress regarding the JPL challenge. For the Kevin Arm, it hasn't been fully assembled yet, but the parts have already been made, and all that's left to do is assemble it. For Connor's team's idea, the parts haven't been built yet, but the inital design is already thought of and drawn. For the other one--I'm not sure what it's called--testing is already being done, but accuracy isn't too good.
10/17/16Today, Mr. Miller took me and 3 other students to the workshop so that we could take the safety course exam. It was extremely easy, probably got a 100%--MUCH WOW SUCH PRO!--and now I just have to wait for him to pass me so that I could finally start using the power tools.
10/18/16
THE PENCIL OF THE GODS!!!!!!!!
We have to create right triangles with straws.
StrawWCForm
Today, Mr. Miller revealed to the class the results of the last Wednesday challenge. The Dodgers won the challenge with the Dream Team coming second. I wasn't put into a team because I didn't hand my name on a slip of paper to Mr. Miller. The lesson that I learned from this challenge is that strength isn't always in numbers, since a team of 4 beat a beat of 10+ people.
10/26/16
Today, I worked on a Wednesday Challenge. My group members were John and Max. The goal of this Wednesday challenge was to estimate how many candy corn candies it would take to fill an 8.5/11 sheet of paper. The strategy that my team used was to calculate the area of the paper and the base area of a single candy corn. Afterward, we divided the area of the paper by the base area of the candy corn to get our answer. My team decided that this strategy was the best because it relied on rational mathematics. We ended up losing to Maddie's team because she took a picture of the sample product that Dr. Neat walked around with and counted each one individually (smart).
CandyCornChallengeForm
Oh, and also I made this really cool see-through lego block!!!
Today, the veterans talked about the JPL challenge. They showed us their progress thus far and demonstrated, when able, how each machine functions. Some teams are fighting desparately to finish their machines in time, which is a little bit concerning.
10/29/16 This Saturday, I worked out at the Y with a friend. Towards the latter part of the day, I journeyed to my friend's house where I spent a couple of hours relaxing and enjoying myself in a nonchalant fashion. Later on in the evening, I travelled with my companions to a party located all the way in South Pasadena. The events which transpired here were quite boring, so I shall not go over the details of the night. However, I wish to relay that the party took place in the patio of a mansion. 10/30/16 Today's events consisted of lunch at the Dragon with my family and my brother, a relative who I have not seen for quite some time. We stuffed ourselves with savory and delicious Korean cuisine and proceeded to return back home. My brother left shortly after, and for the rest of the day, I dedicated myself to the study of energy and power, which I was to have a test on in the preceeding day. 10/31/16
The teacher went over another bridge project. Here's the template for it.
BridgePowerpointTemplate
Today, Dr. Neat told us to make a lego block on Google Sketchup. But wait a minute--I already completed this assignment! I created the best lego block I could, and I've already uploaded the pic to my website, so this is basically a free period. I guess I'm gonna get started on my bridge project, you know, gathering all the information that I need to create the powerpoint. Yeah, that sounds like a good idea.
11/2/16
A Wednesday Challenge is about to ensue. The team objective is to create an E on google sketchup, then to give that sketchup to another team so that that team can make the E received.
This is the result of my team's blood, sweat, and tears.
CapitalEChallenge
Today, Dr. Neat showed us the process for calculating our grades. I have a 95% in the class so far, so I'm pretty satisfied with how things are going :). Dr. Neat allowed us to work on websites for the rest of the classtime. He told us to take two pictures and to put them side-by-side: one of the E that we made on GS, and the E that my group turned in.
11/9/16
Today was a Wednesday challenge. This time, groups were assigned by the teacher. We had to estimate the mass of two objects and compare them side-by-side. Then, we were instructed to find the actual mass of the objects using a triple-beam balance and see who our estimates measured up.
Today was last day of JPL presentations. Sam's and Cole's machine made considerable improvement in the sense that they lost much less water than the last demonstration that I saw. The Kevin Arm also made some improvement, but not as much as the other invention. Erin's machine is still a work in progress; they still have to make the finished product.
11/12/16
I did a lot of fun things today with my church. Firstly, we went to Reptile Con and got to touch, hold, and see lots of animals like snakes, lizards, turtles and taranchulas. Secondly, we went to the AMC movie theater to watch the movie Trolls. The movie was only okay; it was a little bit cheesy, but still, I enjoyed the experience. Oh! Before we watched the movie, we went to the park to eat some sandwiches that the pastor prepared. Finally, we dined at Ruby's, which was an unforgettable experience because, not only did they have malts, but they also had refillable fries and choice burgers/sandwiches. Before the day ended, I received a balloon animal of a rubber duck. Thus concluded my day.
Dr. Neat gave us today to update our websites. I still have to complete the E Wednesday Challenge Form--...--It is now the end of the period. I give to you my form IN ALL ITS GLORY!!! >:D.
EWednesdayChallenge(Almost Complete)
EWednesdayChallenge(THE FINISHED PRODUCT >:D)
11/17/16
Today, Mr. Miller took a couple of students and me back into the workshop room. He told us that he thought we had potential and asked us to create something using the techniques we've learned so far. My group decided to build a mini scooter. BUT no one gets to keep the mini scooter. The finished product will end up staying with Mr. Miller.
11/18/16Today, the JPL group demonstrated the four products that they've built thus far. Based on the demonstrations, the non-veterans were to decide on the 3 products to enter into JPL challenge.
11/28/16Today, the class was introduced to the rotate tool on Google Sketchup. Utilizing this instrument, we were instructed to replicate our arch bridges on the program.
11/29/16
Today, the class was informed of the results from the JPL challenge. The veterans summed up how their machines performed, showed pictures and videos of the event, and conveyed the lessons that they took from the challenge.
Today is the beginning of a two-day Wednesday challenge. The goal of the challenge is to design the tallest structure we could think of using the program Google Sketchup. The sketchups we create will be transferred into a file and the files will be assigned at random to each team. Teams are to build the structure that is depicted on this file. Building commences tomorrow.
It's time to start building! (later entry) We tried to build the structure we received, but it was IMPOSSIBLE. The stability of the design was too weak because the design incorporated little to no support.
12/2/16Today, we watched two episodes of Mythbusters. One regarded whether or not yawning is infectious, and the other tested if a man inside a car, dropped from a distance of x meters, could survive the impact.
12/5/16Today, my team started designing our Final Project on Google Sketchup. We have a general idea of what we want to do. Our plan is to build a slide with a hole at the top so that we could slide a rope through it and tie it to a ring that will be surrounding the starting cup, and when that ring lifts up, it will lift up the cup because the diameter of the ring will be smaller than the biggest diameter of the cup. In order to lift the ring, we'll harness the force of Earth by tying one part of the rope to a rock and dropping it so that when the rock drops, the ring will be lifted up. Thats our idea so far.
12/6/16Today, we worked more on the JPL final. Things are going along pretty well. We're making good progress with our Google Design. I can't wait to start building it! (by the way I'm in charge of the funnel :0o).
12/7/16Still working on the challenge; haven't finished the Google Sketchup yet, but we're making good progress.
12/8/16It's the final seconds of class. All we have to do is to figure out what we want the dimensions of the funnel to be, and then incorporate it into our Google Sketchup design.
Today, my group and I continued working on the final. We used a tablesaw to cut pieces of wood to the dimensions that we need.
12/12/16Today, My group and I worked on the Finals project, trying to develop our sketchup design as much as possible while collecting the necessary parts we need to build the sketchup.
12/13/16Today, My group and I worked on the Finals project, trying to develop our sketchup design as much as possible while collecting the necessary parts we need to build the sketchup.