Project Overview
When faced with the problem of what to do for a challenging, innovative, yet enjoyable and fun senior design project, we looked at our lives here at Notre Dame to see what problems we encounter on a regular basis that could remedied or at least improved in part by the expertise that we have gained through our EE curriculum.
For many students here at Notre Dame, a common weekend activity is the game of beverage pong. One main problem with this game, as it is currently played (especially as the night progresses) is the lack of standardization in cup set-up and gameplay. Thus we chose to utilize our expertise to tackle some of the issues presented in the game of beverage pong.
We realized at the outset that we could implement some sort of electro-mechanical system that would take a lot of the human error out of game set-up and gameplay in a way that would positively augment the player's experience. Thus, we set out to take everything out of the players' hands except for the shooting and consuming (what people are really there for). This required us to tackle robotic motion in two axes, software user interfaces, and a variety of other challenges both within and outside of our EE curriculum.
Throughout this project, we had to push ourselves beyond the boundaries of "Electrical Engineering" proper and delve into mechanical and robotic issues, as well as challenge ourselves electrically. This forced us to be flexible, engaged, and willing to learn. We encountered multiple problems along the way including hardware scarcity, lack of parts knowledge, budget constraints, and personal limitations. In the end, however, we have been able to overcome hurdles that have been thrown our way and produce a fully functional half-table game of beverage pong that meets and surpasses our goals and requirements at the outset of this project.
For more information about our project, please see our documents or contact us.