Click&Move® Motion and Automation Design Contest
ADVANCED Motion Controls® wants to help students with motion control projects and put theory to practice. To do this we've created a contest based on Click&Move®, a Windows-based soft motion and automation solution that uses graphical function blocks as the programming language. The contest has two separate and distinct phases, the first being virtual and the second physical. For some added motivation there is $14,000 in prizes available to the top teams, plus we'll be giving away servo drives and awarding the grand prize winner equipment for their department lab.
- Overview
- Phase I Results
- Phase II
- About Click&Move
- Getting Started with C&M
- Teams & Projects
Overview
In Phase I teams created a virtual motion and automation program with Click&Move (C&M). Now in Phase II teams are creating a physical working machine using Click&Move to control ADVANCED Motion Controls’ DigiFlex® Performance™ servo drives. Entry in Phase I was strongly encouraged but not a prerequisite for Phase II.
Prizes
There's $14000 in cash prizes up for grabs and a single team could conceivably win up to $9000 if they won both Phases I and II. In addition we will be awarding servo drives to help teams develop projects into real-world applications for Phase II of the contest. Lastly for the grand prize winning team we will outfit their University's motion control department lab with new equipment.
Phase I
- 1st - $4,000 and servo drives for up to 3 axes (or more if project dictates for Phase II continuation)
- 2nd - $3,000 and servo drives for up to 3 axes ( “ )
- 3rd - $2,000 and servo drives for up to 3 axes ( “ )
- Consolation – Consideration for the offer of drives for those that didn’t place but moving on to Phase II
Phase II
- Grand Prize - $5000 + Equipment for your Department Lab
- Servo drives for up to 3 axes (or more if project dictates) for top teams demonstrating satisfactory progress.
Phase I Challenge
Create a virtual working motion and automation program with Click&Move, including an HMI representation of the machine, using the tool suite within the C&M software environment. The program must compile, execute and solve a real-world or realistic motion control application.
Timeline (Phase I)
September 7, 2012: Phase I begins and contest officially announced
October 5, 2012: Proposals due for internal evaluation for validity / suggested alterations to proceed
October 5, 2012: Qualified projects posted for program observation
December 17, 2012: Contest deadline for project file and report submissions. Completeness confirmed to include project files with online voting will beginning immediately with peers helping to select the winners
December 31, 2012: Voting complete
January 4, 2013: Winners announced for associated prize awards
Results
Congratulations to UC Merced for winning Phase I and submitting an excellent program and final report!
| University | Project Title | Proposal (25%) |
Execution (30%) |
Operation (45%) |
Comments |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| University of California, Merced | Robust Heliotropic Servo Design for Concentrated Photovoltaic Systems |
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$4,000 Winner goes to the University of California Merced with an overall score of 96%. Congratulations! Evaluation: Good use of HMI features such as trends to record the movements of the sun and of the axes, symbols to animate the sun and solar collector hardware. Good use of User-Defined Function Blocks dividing project into 9 logical blocks. State machine used to control flow of program enhancing maintainability and ease of expansion. Use of example program function blocks such as "TWO_CAN_AXES_SET_UP" to reduce development time. |
| Cal Poly, Pomona | Seed Inspection Pick and Place System |
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$1,000 Honorable mention goes to Cal Poly Pomona for their strong showing. They were unable to enter a working project in time but their efforts were significant and the prospects of developing this into an actual machine are very promising. |
| Other Entrants | Delta Camera Mount, 4-axis Liquid Slosh Simulator, Roll to Roll Web Guide, Stabilized Camera System |
4 additional universities started the competition but were unable to submit final projects and formally withdrew before the contest deadline. We thank these teams for evaluating Click&Move for their projects and understand that classes and other workloads created time constraints. |
Evaluation Guidelines |
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When evaluating each team we considered three separately weighted categories. 1) Proposal - 25% of the score. Does the proposed project solve a real-world or realistic problem? 2) Execution - 30% of the score. How much has the team participated in our online forum? Did they submit a C&M program? Does the program compile? Have they submitted the final Project Report and how well was it written? 3) Operation - 45% of the score. The most important category - does the program work as intended? Letter grades - To help with the selection process, letter grades are included in the icons for the Proposal, Final Report and C&M Program. The evaluations were performed by ADVANCED Motion Controls personnel. |
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Proposal (25%) |
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A proposal has been submitted and evaluated with a letter grade. Click to view each team's proposal. |
Execution (30%) |
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Team has registered with the Technical Support Forum. The number indicates the number of posts - the more the better. |
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The completed Click&Move program has been submitted to ADVANCED Motion Controls |
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The Click&Move program successfully compiles. |
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A Project Report has been submitted and evaluated with a letter grade. Click to view each team's report. |
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Operation (45%) |
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The Click&Move program runs as intended. Evaluated with a letter grade. |
Timeline (Phase II)
If you intend to participate in Phase II of the contest, notify us as soon as possible before you submit your proposal.
December 14, 2012: Phase II begins and contest officially announced.
January 11, 2013: Proposals due for internal evaluation for validity / suggested alterations to proceed.
February 15, 2013: 1/3 progress checkpoint with bill of materials, C&M project and status report due.
March 22, 2013: 2/3 progress checkpoint with proof of established communication with C&M and progress with hardware development.
April 26, 2013: Contest deadline for project file, video and report submissions. Completeness confirmed to include project files and video.
April 29 - May 3, 2013: Online voting open to the public (Tentative)
May 3 , 2013: Voting complete and winner announced for associated prize award
Details Phase II
The Challenge:
Create a physical working motion and automation machine or equipment with Click&Move®, including HMI, using the tool suite within the C&M software environment and ADVANCED Motion Controls’ DigiFlex® Performance™ servo drives. The project must compile, execute and solve an actual motion control application. Entry in Phase I strongly encouraged but not required.
- There is no cost to enter. Simply submit your project proposal via an email to contest@a-m-c.com. Project proposals will be evaluated for validity and alterations suggested as needed. Proposal Guidelines and "Sample Proposal" (updated 9/25).
- Download C&M Version 4.1.3 here (250MB).
- Utilize our online technical support by registering to our online forum.
- Send us the project files and video upon completion for verification.
- Project summary and video will be posted with our fair and unbiased comments based on a few categories and assessment of achievement.
- Final judging will be determined with one week of voting by an online process with one vote per IP max allowed.
Overview
Function Blocks
The Function Block (FB) is the foundation of a Click&Move® project.
FB's are to the motion engineer what IC's are to the electrical engineer. FB's contain inputs and outputs and have associated names and data types. Each FB contains code (like a small program) that defines it's functionality and mapping to the corresponding motion control environment. As a project is developed, C++ code is automatically generated when compiling but the user is only exposed to a simple top level interface. However, if needed the code is always accessible for more sophisticated programming.
Function Blocks can be combined to expand their functionality or if desired, created from scratch with C++. These new FB's can then be added to the Function Block Library so they are readily available for your project(s).
Function Block Diagrams
Groups of Function Blocks are assembled into Function Block Diagrams (FBD's). This is analogous to how electrical components are assembled into circuits. In fact Click&Move® uses an electrical schematic editor called "Eagle" from CadSoft to represent FBD's as schematics. Eagle's libraries of electronic components have been replaced by Function Block Libraries. This enables the user to create FBD's in the same manner as an engineer would design an electrical schematic.
FBD's are used for more than just motion control. They define every aspect of a Click&Move® system including communication, motion, Human Machine Interface (HMI), state machine and more.
Graphical HMI (Human Machine Interface)
The Graphical HMI is used to display and control machine operations on screen. Make a rough representation of your machine or spend more time and include the fine details. Then link your project variables to the graphics and watch your machine come to life!
Application Program
The final application program is composed of groups of Function Block Diagrams. After all of the functionality has been defined in the FBD's, the project can be compiled into executable code. The binary code can then be run on any office or industrial PC with Windows or Windows embedded OS.
Virtual Axes
For testing purposes virtual axes can be used in place of physical hardware. Virtual axes are the software equivalent of physical servo drives and I/O modules with all of their features built-in. Motor position is indicated and I/O ports are represented and correspond to the number and type of I/O ports on the physical servo drive or module. The entire operation of the machine can be represented and tested without the need for physical components.
Equipment Operation
When ready to run physical machinery or equipment, simply change the configuration of the axes and connect the hardware components. (Upgrade to CM-CD-HD required)
PC programming environment requirements
- Pentium 2GHz or better (Core2duo is recommended)
- 512 MB of RAM (1 GB recommended)
- 350 MB of hard disk space
- Windows XP
Motion control system requirements
- DigiFlex® Performance™ DPC-series and/or DZC-series servo drives
- CANopen Network Interface Card (Kvaser Leaf Light HS)
- PC as described above
Future enhancements
- Export and run C&M applications into embedded controllers (with Linux)
- Coordinated motion
- Additional field networks
- Hard real-time operation
Getting Started with Click&Move®
Submit your project proposal via an email to contest@a-m-c.com. Project proposals will be evaluated for validity and alterations suggested as needed. Proposal Guidelines and "Sample Proposal" (updated 9/25).
Download and install the Click&Move software Version 4.1.3 here(250MB). Version 4-1-3 is the official version for the Click&Move contest.
When you first launch Click&Move a window will open with links to help you get started. We suggest you start with the link: "Introductory Overview (flash video)".
After viewing the Introductory Overview, try the videos found in the "Tutorial Videos" link. The fastest way to learn is to have Click&Move running while watching the videos. This will allow you to make the same tutorial projects while the videos play. Use the pause and rewind controls liberally to understand what's going on.
If you get stuck, please sign up to our forum and post your questions.
Teams and Projects
These are the teams that competed in Phase II of the contest.
| University | Project Title | Proposal | Team Members |
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|---|---|---|---|---|
| University of California, Merced | Robust Heliotropic Servo Design for Concentrated Photovoltaic Systems |
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Peter Ferrell Grant McGregor Trevor Murdock Brennan Stevenson Brandon Stark Dr. YangQuan Chen, Advisor |
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| Cal Poly, Pomona | Seed Inspection Pick and Place System |
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Chris Ohara Tim Tsang |