Principles and Practices

Week 1. Plan and sketch a potential final project.

Project Management

Week 2. Build a personal site describing me and the final project. Upload it to the class archive.

Computer-Aided Design

Week 3. Model a possible final project, and post it on class page with original 2D and 3D files.

Computer-Controlled Cutting

Week 4. Lasercut and vinylcut, design and make a parametric press-fit construction kit, which can be assembled in multiple ways.

Electronics Production

Week 5. Make an in-circuit programmer by milling the PCB.

3D Scanning and Printing

Week 6. Design and 3D print an object that could not be made subtractively, 3D scan an object.

Electronics Design

Week 7. Redraw the echo hello-world board, add a button and LED (with current-limiting resistor), check the design rules, and make it.

Computer-Controlled Machining

Week 8. Make something big (on a CNC machine).

Embedded Programming

Week 9. Read a microcontroller data sheet, program a board to do something.

Molding and Casting

Week 10. Design a 3D mould, machine it, and cast parts from it.

(Week 11. Break week of Fab Academy.)

Input Devices

Week 12. Measure something: add a sensor to a microcontroller board designed and read it.

Output Devices

Week 13. Design and add an output device to a microcontroller board and read it.

Interface and Application Programming

Week 14. Write an application that interfaces with an input and/or output device made earlier.

Networking and Communications

Week 15. Design and build a wired &/or wireless network connecting at least two processors.

Mechanical Design

Week 16. Design a machine that includes mechanism + actuation + automation, build the passive parts and operate it manually.

Machine Design

Week 17. Actuate and automate your machine. Document the group project and your individual contribution.

Wildcard Week: Water Jet Cutting

Week 18. Design and produce something with a digital fabrication process not covered in another assignment.

Applications and Implications

Week 19. Propose a final project that integrates the range of units covered.

Invention, intellectual property, and Income

Week 20. Develop a plan for dissemination of your final project.

Project Development

Week 21. Complete your final project.