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snitch catcher
Snitch Cather is a drone equipped with an arm to catch balls in some tricky situations like cliffs and water surface. Snitch Cather is the product of the jointed competition held by Tonji University in China.
Mission
The drone needs to catch three ping-pong balls from three places- one is placed in a basin, another one is placed on a stick, and the other one is put on a cliff- and then bring the ball back to the starting point.
My 1st Role / Arm Design
I work on the mechanical design of the arm for grabbing ping-pongs and make the prototype of it. Because the drone cannot carry too heavy material, I turn the plastic bottle into the arm, which material is not only light-weight but also its elasticity makes it easy to catch and draw out the ball.
My 2nd Role / Programmer
I am also in charge of the program of the arm, including the servo control and the blue-tooth transmission from a mobile phone to a drone.
Development Process
Phase 1
Quickly examine ideas from reachable materials.
Phase 2
Make the functional prototypes using laser- cutting and define the stroke.
Phase 3
Add the actuator and optimize the design like the replaceable bottle cap and counterweights.
Performance & Challenge
From a basin
The arm did not work perfectly on catching ping-pong from a basin since the ball flows away while the drone got close to the water.
From a cliff
The difficulty of grabbing a ball from a cliff is between a basin and from a stick because the edge might clash with the drone.
From a stick
Caught a ping-pong ball on a standing stick is the easiest task once the drone is positioned right above the ball.
