The phase consisted of the implementation of the hardware and control systems developed during the project into one robotic arm system.
The learned structures of the joystick input, servo motor control, and multi-axis control work as individual components in this stage. However, in a real robotic system, all these elements must work together at the same time.
In this process, students learned that a robotic system is not just a collection of separate parts, but an integrated system where inputs and outputs are interconnected.
The robotic arm used in this project operates according to the following structure:
The joystick generates analog input values, which are processed by the ESP32. The control code then translates these inputs to servo motor angle commands. The robotic arm moves physically. Thus, students could observe the realization of the Input-Process-Output structure they had studied in previous lessons in a real robotic system.
A robotic arm does not depend on one joint; several joints need to work together at the same time.
In this stage, the students could identify the joystick axis that controlled each servo motor and understand how a multi-axis control system coordinates the motion of several joints simultaneously.
This gave practical insight into the differences between controlling a single motor and a multi-axis robotic system.
The joystick, ESP32 and the PWM Servo Driver were connected and the whole system was tested to check for proper communication. Students were able to identify which input devices controlled which servo motors thus had a better idea of the relationship between input and output devices.