Hi, I'm Luca.

Over winter break of first year, I teamed up with an engineering student from the University of Waterloo to build a six-wheel rover using rocker-bogie suspension, the same passive design NASA uses on its Mars rovers. It combined mechanical design, manufacturing, electronics, and embedded code in one build.

Design

Every part was modelled in Fusion 360. The two rockers pivot independently and connect through a central differential that averages their angles, which keeps the body level while individual wheels climb. I iterated on the differential geometry before printing, then hand-sanded its contact surfaces until it rotated freely.

Electronics

An ESP32 drives two motor driver modules, one per side, each running a stepper motor chosen for its low-speed torque. I wrote the firmware in the Arduino IDE and tuned step timing by hand to get smooth movement without skipped steps.

Result

The rover drives over obstacles and carpet with the platform staying level. Push one side over an object and the body barely tilts.

What I'd change

The motor housings sit too low and hit large obstacles before the wheels can climb, the battery couldn't supply steady torque, and glued wheels kept coming loose. Version two raises the motor mounts, adds a built-in battery bay, and uses a press-fit bushing in each wheel hub. Next I want to add an I²C gyroscope to log pitch and roll and classify terrain.

After watching how Formula 1 teams and tuners test engines, I wanted to understand how a dynamometer works by building one from scratch and going through the full design cycle, from idea to a physical result.

How it works

A motor spins a shaft carrying two hard-drive platters. A braking structure with wooden friction pads clamps around them, and the friction pulls it upward. That force acts on a torque arm that presses on a digital scale, so the reading and the arm length give torque:

τ [N·m] = (scale reading [kg] × 9.81) × arm length [m]

Build

I milled holes through the platters and designed two interlocking SolidWorks parts that press-fit them onto the shaft, measuring everything with calipers first. The frame is wood cut on stationary shop tools, with 3D-printed mounts. Wing nuts on the brake let me tune clamping force in seconds instead of reprinting parts.

RPM sensing

I milled a hole in the disc assembly so a laser passes through once per revolution. A BH1750 light sensor detects each pulse over I²C, and an ESP8266 converts pulses per second into RPM. It's soldered, wired, and tested on a breadboard, ready to mount in the next version.

I competed in the VEX Robotics Competition every year from Grade 6 to Grade 11. Each season brings a brand-new game, so every year meant designing new mechanisms from scratch.

Grade 11: Over Under

My last and highest-stakes season. Teams score Triballs, green triangular game pieces, into goal zones by getting them over or under a barrier in the centre of the field. I was the designated programmer and an assistant builder on the senior team, and I built two of the robot's key mechanisms:

• A high-accuracy catapult that launches Triballs over the barrier.
• Retractable arms that sweep Triballs under the barrier net.

What it taught me

A design that works on paper doesn't always work on the field. Our autonomous routine was supposed to turn 40 degrees and kept veering left instead, so we tested and adjusted it over and over until it ran reliably. That testing, and a lot of late nights, got us to BC Provincials.

Volunteering

From Grade 6 to 12 I also volunteered at tournaments. As a referee and scorekeeper I made precise calls under pressure. As a judge I evaluated teams on their design process and documentation, and on how they communicated and worked together, not just on rehearsed answers.

• Working with the team lead on the mechanical systems for the V1.85 TVR drone.
• Designing a drop-test cage and running SolidWorks FEA to characterize landing impact forces and validate structural decisions on the V1 drone.
• Designing and hand-soldering a custom PCB with a load cell, IMU, and strain gauges to capture real-time impact data from the drop cage.

Our team designed and costed an off-grid system that collects rainwater, disinfects it, stores it, and delivers it to a home. Rain runs off a catchment into a collection tank, gets pumped through disinfection to storage, then passes through UV and filtration on its way to the tap.

Modelling

I built a day-by-day spreadsheet model using real rainfall data. For each day it tracks inflow, consumption, and stored water, then works out the energy needed for pumping, ozone disinfection, and UV treatment. That gave us a total daily energy demand to size the power system around.

My role

As lead designer, I split the work so each teammate's strengths were used. I developed the performance forecasts using applied fluid dynamics and pump curve calculations, and we used them to weigh the key design variables and refine component selection.