Fun Day at Uni making an Electronic Decision Maker

I used to love soldering and have hands-on at anything. Today, Hugo and me helped out Dr Tate and Vic in guiding younger students build their own Electronic Decision Maker. These things are more fun than the AM radio we did in our first year. The design has a lot of engineering in it – a lot  of thought went behind the design and packaging. The objective was clearly to make students want o do electrical and electronics engineering – without them realising, it is not as easy and fun as it seems!

Well, helping the students out was fun – especially when the circuit was pretty simple and they were not really a curious bunch(unlike first years when I do lab demonstrating). Anyhow, Hugo and me were so keen on making our own toy – so Dr Tate agreed to allow us. Soldering on the PCB was never easier – took me just 5 minutes to solder the whole thing – something I am proud off! Check out the device – it basically squeals  when you put two fingers across the connector(at the same time the LED flashes according to how much resistance the skin gives) and when you remove your fingers, the capacitor slowly discharges and the LED will alternate until it stops at one of it(making decisions of Yes, No, Maybe and Repeat) to any questions that you have!

CAP trip to Kew Gardens

Saturday was well spent going shopping with Mel to the FCUK sample sales. Following 9 hours of shopping(includes lunch and meeting up with the rest of the gang), we had a Russian style bbq – courtesy of Alexei. He brought this really nice Russion vodka as well. The meat were well marinated(he was so considerate for not cooking beef, as Jas, vix and me are non-beef eaters). Pictures are up on Facebook under Russian style BBQ.

It was difficult to wake up on Sunday morning – but managed to do it. The boat trip was windy but we had really good view of things around – from Westminster to Kew Gardens. Upon arrival, we were pleasantly shocked that they agreed to let us in for free( as we do research on renewable energy). The area was huge with sooo many things to see. After our lunch(paid by CAP), we explored the temperate house, palm house, and the most awaited – treetop, before heading to the Kew Palace(which was boring).

I decided to join Daniele at a pub on King’s Road for the finals – it was packed with Spanish supporters – well good game by the spaniards and they deserve the win. Following that, we had a kebab whilst discussing politics(very interesting – but I was sick by then due to tiredness and change in weather).