ELECTRONIC DESIGN STUDIO 2007

Electronic Design Studio is a workshop run for year 11 science students to give them a hands on introduction to designing, building and testing electronic modules.

The project chosen for 2007 is a programmable game module that can be used for noughts and crosses (tic tac toe) or an electronic dice and is suitable for memory games etc. The game module can also be used as a crane control module to introduce the student to mechatronics. The crane module has a stepper motor for the turntable, a dc motor for the winch and provision for an electromagnet to be raised and lowered.

Motor Board

The idea of making a noughts and crosses game came from the October 2007 issue of Silicon Chip magazine which featured a revised "Oscar" using a PIC16F84A microcontroller. We decided to use a Picaxe 08M microcontroller due to it's low cost, $4, as all students taking part in the Design Studio get to keep all of the parts of their project, ease of programming and excellent support and documentation through the Revolution Education Picaxe site.The bicolour led's are set out in a 3 x 3 matrix to match the number keys on an Altronics numeric keypad (S5381).

The assembley, testing and programming of the game module takes a day as there is a safety induction and a soldering video before assembly can begin. Go to the Tic Iac Toe Game Module for a description of how the circuit works, troubleshhoting guide and sample Picaxe programs.

The crane pcb assembley begins on the second day and is the interface between the game module and the crane's motors, sensors and electromagnet. Go to the Crane Module for a description of how the circuit works, troubleshhoting guide and sample Picaxe programs.

We have supplied a 10 volt dc 1 amp plugpack to power the game module and crane to remove the risk of working with a mains power supply. UWA policy requires that all portable electrical equipment is tested and tagged to AS/NZS3760:2003 so we give the participants an introduction to Non Hostile environments and teach them how to visually inspect their plugpacks and then they attach a Visual Inspection tag.