Introduction

The purpose of this onboarding is to teach you everything that cannot be taught in a YouTube tutorial. As such, it will be software agnostic. Use your preferred CAD software. If you have never touched CAD software before, the University of Waterloo has free Solidworks licenses for students.

For this project, you will be creating a case/mounting solution for a raspberry Pi and camera. It is expected you know the very basics around the CAD software of your choice, such as creating a sketch/drawing, dimensioning/constraining, and extruding.

It is difficult to quantify what makes a design “good” or “bad”. It is easier to highlight when a design has forgotten to consider one important aspect or another, so this onboarding will highlight subjects that should be considered when designing.

The “Ask”

The most important thing when designing something is to know what the priorities are. Here are some important questions you should ask before opening any CAD software:

1. What does this thing accomplish? — almost all of Engineering is creating solutions to problems. Do you know what the problem is?
2. Does this thing need to be done well or done quickly?
   1. Will something that already exists do the trick?
   2. Keep in mind the hardware that is on hand — buying (and shipping) something takes a long time!
3. Is weight or strength more important? Does it need to be rigid? Is precision important? Does it need to withstand being very hot or cold? — Often times the context will inform which aspects are more important, but if you aren’t sure, ask!
4. Are there parts you need to design around?
   1. Is there a preexisting CAD of those parts?
   2. Do parts need to be enclosed?
   3. Do parts need cooling/airflow?
   4. What hardware(nuts and bolts, screws, etc.) are available or should be used?
5. What will the thing be made of?
   1. How will this thing be made? — for the purposes of this onboarding, you will be designing something that will be 3D printed on an FDM printer. This will give you unique freedoms and drawbacks compared to other manufacturing methods, such as CNC, waterjet, laser cutting, or even sheet metal bending. Feel free to research 3D printing specific topics such as supports, infill, wall thickness, and different plastic types such as PLA, PETG, ABS, ASA, and TPU.

There are an infinite amount of questions that can be thought up of to inform your design, but these are some of the more important ones.

Please choose from one of the scenarios below:

Scenario 1: VITracker Testbench

You have been asked to design a platform to securely mount a Raspberry Pi 5 and also a camera. Though not required, it would be nice if some sort of modularity was added so FPGA dev boards could be mounted in the future as well. The camera mount is ideally adjustable, and the platform should be stable and resist being tipped over. Assume the camera cable is 20cm long.

Here is something similar to give you some ideas.