8.6 Conclusions and Future Work

Conclusions

Overall, our mechanism did a good job of achieving its intended purpose. The bowling arm successfully launched the marble at the correct speed and time to knock down the pins. The bowling alley did not introduce unnecessary friction, and the marble travelled smoothly. The only major area that our mechanism did not perform well in is creating the spin in the marble that professional bowling tends to include.

Future Plans

Although the bowling game achieved its purpose, there are many areas we can improve in the future. Including a ball return system and an automatic bowling pin placer would significantly improve the quality of the game. Additionally, the electronic parts of the system were cumbersome, and we could add a more organized electronic system for player usability in the future. Future iterations could also spend time on improving the spin on the marble.

Lessons Learned

One aspect of this mechanism that needed the most refinement was the release mechanism. The goals of the mechanism were to generate spin in the marble, prevent the marble from falling at the wrong time, and flick the marble upon release for a good start velocity. Designing the release mechanism exercised our creativity since we needed to emulate a real bowling game as closely as possible.

We also learned how to reduce the amount of friction in our mechanism by switching from sliders to a ternary link. We initially used two sliders for the bowling motion but realized this would be difficult to manufacture.

Acknowledgements

We would like to thank our professor, Dr. Symmank, and our TAs, Connor and Mila, for their help with this project. We would also like to thank the TIW for the laser cutters, 3D printers, tools, and other resources.