Studies+Projects

2018 Summer Ambassador with Recycling Council of Alberta (click image)

FIRST Robotics Team (scroll down)

Karmax Video Training Manuals (scroll)

Fuel-Cell Car Project (scroll down)

Bass Guitar Tube Amplifier (scroll down)

3D Printer CAD Projects (scroll down)

Robot for Connect 4 Game (scroll down)

FIRST Robotics Team Wildebots

I was a Member of Team 4902 Wildebots for two years, including their rookie year. My second year on the team I was Lead Programmer and Robot Driver. Last year, during a co-op workterm, I was a Team Mentor, inspiring the students with stories of my experience with FIRST Robotics. FIRST is "For Inspiration & Recognition of Science & Technology" and practices gracious professionalism in their competitions where alliances are formed to battle each other on the playing field. For more information on my experience with FIRST Robotics, click here to visit the Wildebots website.

Bass Guitar Tube Amplifier

I am rather fond of playing guitar and bass. It provides a welcome form of relaxation when I am stressing during a heavy load of schoolwork. During one of my co-op workterms, I was fortunate to be involved with a project to design and build a prototype for a bass guitar tube amplifier. Why tubed you ask? There is no comparison between a solid-state amp and tube amp if you are looking for a fat, warm, and natural tone for you bass guitar. This project engaged my formal education in circuits and soldering and blended with my interest in music reproduction. I hope to continue this work as a hobby and potentially bring my own bass amp design to market. For more information on a line of tube guitar amps, click here to visit Edward Amplification.

Karmax Video Training Manuals

Before I entered the Mechatronics program, I worked a summer on the production line at a large, local automotive parts manufacturer. It's a dirty, smelly, noisy job and great experience for someone who has an interest in robotics because I was the human partner to a huge variety of machines. My favourite line produced bumpers for the old Crown Vic, a car still in use by some police forces. It was an old line with ancient computers and equipment that broke down often and did not move very fast. The following summer, during my first workterm I moved to the engineering office where I gained firsthand knowledge of process in producing video training manuals for workers on various lines. This was an invaluable experience in teamwork, technical knowledge, planning, communications and... videography and video-editing! Click here for more information on this parts manufacturer.

3D Printer CAD Projects

During one of my workterms, I did a short stint as a 3D Printer QA and Finisher. I was responsible for ensuring the quality, using a variety of techniques, for the 3D printed objects for a rapid prototype company. The company encouraged creativity and I was lucky enough to be allowed to create designs on CAD and to produce some prototypes of my own on a 3D Printer. My designs were pretty basic but I look forward to more advanced projects in the future. Click here for more information on this rapid prototyper and 3D Printer supplier.

Fuel-Cell Car Project

In first year of Mechatronics Engineering, a group project was the Fuel-Cell Car. This project integrates several courses: programming, mechatronics and chemistry. The goal of the Fuel-Cell Car project is to “assemble, program, debug, and analyze a small vehicle powered by hydrogen fuel cells.” This small electric car is “controlled with a micro-controller, driven by electric motors, and powered by hydrogen fuel cells.” There was a fun competition between teams to wrap up this interesting project that provided a fun lesson in micro-controllers, teamwork, and integrating lessons from several course subjects. For more information on this project, click here to read an article on integrative activities for first-year students.

Robot Player for Connect 4 Game

One of our first group projects in Mechatronics Engineering was to design a Robot to play the well-known Connect 4 game where the object is to get 4 chips in a row before your opponent. This project's goal was to design, build and program a Lego NXT Robot to efficiently play the game and to block a human player from winning Connect 4. The Robot was programmed using C++ with the algorithm designed to prevent a human player from winning the game. To view the final code for this project, click here.

E  jorrenem @ gmail .com
C  289.300.1666