Welcome to my website documenting my internship at the Center for Really Neat Research in Syracuse, New York.

During this internship, I have had on-the-job training every day. This page contains links for each week that I have worked here, and will document my entire internship. This internship has not been a 9-5 and has been all day and night work with random hours. I know I do not have all of the work that I have done here documented yet, so if you have any questions please email me and I will be happy to answer your questions or comments..

Any background information on me can probably be obtained on my resume or my homepage.

Skip to project pages... HeadTracker Lego Glove Velostat Pressure Sensors Data Glove How to wire components.. Pay Schedule

Week 1 Week 2 Week 3 Week 4 Week 5 Week 6 Week 7 Week 8 Week 9 Week 10 Week 11

OCTOBER

Week 1

• Learned how to wire Photocells and Potentiometers.
• Worked on the DARPA handgrip for a mine detector. Primary resonsiblities were to wire and test potentiometers that were inside of the grip and make them a compatable interface for the THING3s.
• Attending a meeting with a local Cybercafe to discuss the potential of displaying THINGS and other CRNR gear at the cafe.

Week 2

• Worked on running Neattools in a Virtual PC environment. Limited sucess, but sucess all the same. The Neattools program ran fine, however Macintosh processors can not Multithread yet (They will be able to in the G4 Series expected in Early 99). Without Multithreading, the Neattools program will not run in the background, and will stay at the last process untill you go back to Virtual PC. Tests with other PC emulation programs were also tried (RealPC and SoftWindows 95) but with the same results. All of the PC emulators ran Neattools fine, but Virtual PC ran them faster.
• Tests were done on a 233 G3 Imac with 64 meg ram and a 6 meg Vram chip.
• Worked on ways for the Mine Detector grip to have a tactile vibrating interface.

Week 3

• Used Legos to model a glove than can collect and interpret wrist movements. So far the best development was using small lego rods to push potentiometers mounted back on the forearm.
• Shopped and surfed for a toy that had a vibrating mechanism inside of it for the mine detector. Also looked for a website with broken pagers for sale. Started using a doorbell buzzer for a vibrating mechanism inside the Mine Detector Grip and wired it up. The immediate problem with it was the amount of space the buzzer required. In addition, after trimming all of the excess of the buzzer off, the buzzer was not buzzing as loud as it was before and was not as noticeable. However, it did work.
• Started work on Sister Kenny Project using Pressure Sensors to monitor Patient Movement. Made Velostat sensors for Sister Kenny Project. The sensors worked great, and we experimented with different ways to make them.

Week 4

• Replaced the doorbell buzzer with the motor from a massage device. This device turned out to be much better, but still required too much room. After setting up the grip with the new motor, similiar results occured as with the doorbell buzzer. This meathod of tactile interface has been dropped untill a new one is conceived.
• The Velostat sensors for Sister Kenny seem to be wearing out faster than we would like. We left a 50 pound concrete bag on a few of the sensors and found that after a weekend the original sensors will fade and become less sensitive. We worked on ways to get around this in Neattools, and found that we can recallibrate the sensors for each use. This would greatly extend the use of the sensors, but the life of them is not yet determined. Fortunately, these sensors are incredibly cheap and the idea of a disposable sensor is possible if no workaround is thought of.
• As for the Glove that can monitor up/down wrist movement, we are know using "slide" potentiometers instead of the wheel potentiometers and have found it to be much more stable..

NOVEMBER

Week 5

• New Velostat Sensors have been designed and were wired. Preliminary tests were very good and we will continue with different tests and different sensors.
• Met with a Work Study student for Mindtel "Josh". I am now helping to cordinate his activities in the house and provide him with the easiest ways to learn and get up to speed.
• Met Eyal Sherman.
• Recieved and watched video for new patient. His capabilities are limited to partial neck movement and complete eye and blinking cordination. Hall Effect Sensors are going to be ordered and tested to see if we can take advantage of his perfect eye ability.
• Went to TeachingTools Trade Show and represented I^3 with Matt Carbone. Setup a webcam, magic carpet, and a few different sensors for demonstration purposes. We also discussed with trade show attendees what I^3 does and the technology we use to do it.

Week 6

• Started to wire a Head Tracker for use with a new patient. The Head Tracker has 6 potentiometers at each joint. Each Potentiometer has 5k and ground chained from one to another for all of them so that fewer wires come out the bottom of the tracker.
• Built A Sensor Pack containing: 4 Photocells, 2 Potentiometers, 2 Bend Sensors, and 2 Photoboxes (Standard Project Box with 8 Photocells comming from the top with stereo plugs that are Thing3 Compatable).
• Learned the Difference between the stereo plug wiring between Thing3 and Thing2.
• Worked on and wired an interface that straps onto the forearm. The interface has 4 rocker switches which outputs 16 seperate digital signals that all run into one thing. To get all 16 digital signals to run into Thing3 (Which only has 8 Analog and 8 Digital ports) we rewired 8 of plugs to run into the stereo plug. This was done by running a 10k resistor from Tip to signal on a regular stereo plug, and then running the wires from the interface to the Tip and Ground of the stereo plugs.
• Worked with Josh on showing him how to properly wire a photocell and run the resistors for most of the widgets.

Week 7

• Working on Webumentary
• Built another Thing3 Sensor Pack (4 Photocells, 2 Potentiometers, 1 Bend Sensors).
• Developing Sensor Pack prototype for Mass Production
• Made Dr. Scholes's Foot Sensors. These are insoles for shoes that we fitted with 4 Velostat sensors in different parts of the feet.
• Working on Glove for Mobile Command Station. We are trying to get the glove to monitor wrist movement up and down and left and right. This is currently prototyped as a lego glove that has a sliding potentiometer on the wrist of the glove, which is hooked up to thin lego rods attached on the hand.. When the hand moves in a direction, it pushes or pulls the sliding potentiometers. This model is basically the lego model but with an extra arm attachment for the sliding potentiometers.
• Worked with Josh on showing him how to properly wire a potentiometer and run the resistors for most of the widgets.

Week 8

• A lot more work has been done on the Mobile Command Station Glove. This glove can monitor Up/Down Wrist movement, bending three fingers using three bend sensors, and can monitor the pressure exerted on three fingers of the hand using velostat sensors. The glove worked great, but did not look as nice as we would have liked it to. The next glove will have a nicer, more profesional look to it, but will most likely follow the same electrical plan that we had on this glove. This glove had no lego components.
• Decided to rewire the headtracker. All tests trying to share a common ground and a common 5k have failed. Using the common ground and 5k caused all of the data to change whenever any one of the potentiometers changed.
• Went with Mike to the Internet CyberCafe. We setup a magic carpet in the entryway so that every velostat sensor

Week 9

• Finished the Mobile Command Station Glove. The new model is much more durable and more professional.
• Worked with Josh and taught about 4 hours of Neattools this week. Progress is quick, and the learning curve is very low with him for Neattools.
• Started to clean out the E-lab. A very overwhelming experience.
• Made a second Mobile Command Station Glove.
• Worked on Webumentary.

Week 10

• Finished the headtracker. The rewiring is fine and all data is great except for the very bottom potentiometer which has a short inside the potentiometer from 5k to ground. A replacement potentiometer has been requested, but will not arrive before I leave. It is not a crucial component of the head tracker, but the more data the better.
• The patient that we were hoping the head tracker would apply to has less head movement than originally anticipated. The project is finished,works, and waiting to be applied to a new patient.
• Built widgets for the FCC test (5 Photocells).
• Worked on Webumentary.

Week 11

• Mike, Josh, and I did a facelift to the E-lab
• Searched with Dr. Warner, Mike, and Matt for a USB Joystick and a wireless-tilt-sensor-joystick at the local mall. We were able to find both at an Electronics Boutique. I then attended a business dinner with them.
• Worked with Josh on wiring many different widgets for Dr. Warner's upcomming trip.
• Attended meeting with a potential patient's therapists. They were introduced to the neattools system and the goals of the therapists were discussed.
• Building another pair of Data Gloves.
• Worked and finished webumentary.

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