ASTRAEUS
Prototype Solar Support Rover
Weekly Meetings
Week 1: 5/6/2025
Start Time: -
End Time: -
Meeting Summary:
No official meeting was held during the first week. Instead, the team reached out to Dr. Hall to coordinate the recurring meeting schedule for the semester. After reviewing availability, we agreed to hold weekly meetings on Tuesdays at 11:00 AM. In the meantime, the team continued progress on the project by focusing on finalizing the CAD models for critical subsystems in preparation for upcoming design reviews.
Deliverables:
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Finish Rocker-Bogie Prints
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Begin Printing Arm Parts
Week 2: 5/13/2025
Start Time: 11:00 AM
End Time: 11:47 AM
Agenda:
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Review syllabus
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Discuss Project Progress
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Discuss Report Expectations
Meeting Summary:
During our first meeting of Senior Design with Dr. Hall, we reviewed expectations for the senior design course and evaluated our current progress. Dr. Hall provided guidance on how to align our written report with course standards, ensuring clarity, structure, and professionalism throughout. We discussed strategies for refining our documentation and set clear deliverables to meet upcoming milestones.
Deliverables:
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Prepare a rough draft of the updated design report including:
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Title page
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Table of Contents
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List of Tables
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Chapter 1: Introduction
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Chapter 2: Background
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Rough Draft of Chapter 3
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Continue Final Assembly of the project to prepare for testing.
Week 3: 5/20/2025
Start Time: 11:00 AM
End Time: 11:37 AM
Agenda:
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Review report progress
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Discuss project assembly
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Review Project modifications
Meeting Summary:
In this week’s meeting, the team discussed the progress of the report, the current status of the project assembly, and reviewed design changes being made during the build process. Dr. Hall and the group members agreed on several key action items to be completed by the following week. These include fully building the chassis, finding and integrating a suitable emergency stop switch, assembling the rocker-bogie suspension system, and continuing to draft Chapter 3 of the report.
Deliverables:
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Finalize Chassis
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Continue Drafting Report (Chapter 3)
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Find Emergency Stop Button
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Assemble Rocker Bogie
Week 4: 5/27/2025
Start Time: 11:00 AM
End Time: 11:33 AM
Agenda:
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Review assembly progress
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Identify missing components
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Begin system testing
Meeting Summary:
In this week’s meeting, the team reviewed the progress made on the assembly. The right side of the rocker-bogie system was successfully completed, but the group encountered setbacks preventing full assembly of the left side. These delays were primarily due to missing components, including the motor shaft hub and a suitable connecting rod for attaching the chassis to the rocker. Initial testing for communication with the Raspberry Pi was initiated using SSH. The team agreed on the upcoming tasks, which include completing the full rocker-bogie assembly and starting movement tests on the 5-axis robotic arm.
Deliverables:
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Finish Rocker-Bogie Assembly
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Acquire Missing Hub and Connecting Rod
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Begin Testing 5-Axis Arm Movements
Week 5: 6/3/2025
Start Time: 11:00 AM
End Time: 11:52 AM
During this meeting, I informed Dr. Hall that the full assembly of the rocker-bogie suspension system for Astraeus had been completed. The system was successfully integrated with the main chassis and drive configuration, marking a major milestone in the mechanical build. While the suspension is functional, we discussed that slight modifications would be needed to improve structural rigidity and ensure more stable movement over uneven terrain. Dr. Hall was pleased with the progress and encouraged thorough documentation of the adjustments and testing results. Despite the minor refinements ahead, we remain on track with the project timeline.
Deliverables:
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Start programing movement with the motors
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Finalize Brush Mechanism
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Get more wire/Terminal Blocks
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Test the battery with Buck Converters
Week 6: 6/10/2025
Start Time: 11:00 AM
End Time: 11:42 AM
Meeting Summary:
During this week’s meeting, we reviewed our assembly progress with Dr. Hall and discussed the current status of the project. We also went over our block diagrams and discussed Dr. Ejaz’s suggestions with Dr. Hall to rename them for clarity. The updated titles are now “Arm/Electromechanical Module Block Diagram” and “Drive/Electromechanical Module Block Diagram.” Our primary deliverables for the upcoming days include getting the rover operational, completing the brush assembly, and contacting the UCF Exolith Lab to coordinate scheduling for future testing.
Deliverables:
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Get the rover driving and operational
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Finish assembling the brush
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Reach out to UCF Exolith Lab
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Coordinate and plan future testing with the UCF Exolith Lab
Week 7: 6/17/2025
Start Time: 11:00 AM
End Time: 11:40 AM
Meeting Summary:
During this meeting, I provided Dr. Hall with a status update on the integration of the brush module with the robotic arm for Astraeus. We discussed the challenges of mounting the motor and ensuring consistent bristle contact with the panel surface. I also shared progress on the CAD models and renders of the assembled arm. Dr. Hall emphasized the importance of documenting the brush’s motion limits and performance requirements in the final report. The following weeks deliverables were set to hopefully begin testing subsystems in the next week.
Deliverables:
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Finalize Rover Improvements
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Fix Rocker-Bogie
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Continue Writing Report
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Update Timeline
Week 8: 6/24/2025
Start Time: 11:00 AM
End Time: 11:30 AM
Meeting Summary:
In this week’s meeting, Dr. Hall was shown through the completed wiring diagram of the full system. We reviewed power distribution to each module, including the motor drivers, sensors, and control units. We also discussed progress on drafting Chapter 3 of our final report, specifically the my contributions section. Dr. Hall provided feedback on clarifying the functional purpose of each subsystem and refining the block diagrams for the upcoming workshop with Professor Young. We confirmed that we are staying on track with the project timeline and are positioned to begin testing in the following week as planned.
Deliverables:
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Finish Main Code
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Test Navigation
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Reach out to Exolith Lab
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Revise Block Diagrams for workshop
Week 9: 7/1/2025
Start Time: 11:00 AM
End Time: 11:48 AM
Meeting Summary:
In this week’s meeting, the team updated Dr. Hall on an incident that occurred in the Open Lab, where the rover was accidentally damaged during an unexpected handling event. Though the situation resulted in some laughter, it also served as an unintentional but valuable durability test. Over the weekend prior to the meeting, the team fully rebuilt the rover, focusing on reinforcing the rocker-bogie components and strengthening the rocker mounting points to improve structural integrity. During the meeting, the team showed Dr. Hall the specific reinforcement improvements made to the rover and discussed how these upgrades would contribute to better performance and reliability moving forward.
Deliverables:
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Finish Main Code
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Test Navigation
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Reach out to Exolith Lab
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Revise Block Diagrams for workshop
Week 10: 7/8/2025
Start Time: 11:00 AM
End Time: 11:48 AM
Meeting Summary:
Between the last meeting and this week’s session, the team encountered a major hardware issue when 12V was accidentally fed into the 3.3V logic line, which resulted in the failure of all three VNH5019 motor drivers and the Raspberry Pi. Fortunately, the team was able to quickly source replacements, purchasing three new motor drivers and a Raspberry Pi in time to integrate them back onto the rover before the meeting. Pedro successfully rewired the system with the new components, allowing navigation testing to resume. After reviewing the update, Dr. Hall advised the team to continue pushing forward with testing and emphasized the importance of documenting all progress and challenges thoroughly for inclusion in the final report.
Deliverables:
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Finish Main Code
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Test Navigation
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Reach out to Exolith Lab
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Revise Block Diagrams for workshop
Week 11: 7/15/2025
Start Time: 11:00 AM
End Time: 12:13 AM
Meeting Summary:
This week’s meeting began with a comprehensive project update for Dr. Hall, covering the finalized engineering requirements, engineering specifications, project budget, and power budget. The team also demonstrated the first complete cleaning sequence, showing successful coordination between the robotic arm, cleaning mechanism, and control logic. Pedro presented the finalized system flowcharts, aligned with the implemented code structure, followed by a detailed walkthrough of the comprehensive control code. Lastly, the team addressed that UCF Exolith Lab’s testing quote was far beyond budget. As a result, the team decided to conduct all future testing at designated on-campus locations, ensuring the project stays within budget while still validating core functionality. while the Martian environment is not able to be completely simulated, 1 kilogram of MGS-1 Martian regolith simulant was purchased through UCF to dust a solar panel, providing a realistic surface contamination scenario. The cleaning sequence test validated the rover’s ability to detect and remove surface dust in a controlled environment.
Deliverables:
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Finish Testing the Rover
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Finalize and submit the report by Friday 7/18/25 at 12:01 PM
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Finalize the website by by Friday 7/18/25 at 12:01 PM
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SLEEP
Week 12: 7/22/2025
Start Time: 11:00 AM
End Time: --
Meeting Summary:
Deliverables:
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Finalize Presentation
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Pick up suits from cleaner