Module 0 Mastery Quiz: Engineering Design Process
I. Conceptual Questions
1. Why the Loop: A team argues that the design cycle wastes time, and that a skilled team should be able to design correctly on the first attempt. What is the engineering counterargument?
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The loop does not exist to correct incompetence. It exists to remove uncertainty that cannot be removed by thinking. A design has assumptions in it, such as how a game element behaves when it is off center, how much friction the field tile provides, or how long an alignment takes in practice. Those assumptions can only be checked against a physical thing. A team that runs three cycles has tested three generations of assumptions; a team that runs one has tested none, and discovers all of them at once with no schedule left to respond.
2. Points Per Second: Scoring action A is worth 6 points and takes 9 seconds. Action B is worth 2 points and takes 4 seconds. Which is the better strategy target, and what additional information would change your answer?
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A is worth 0.67 points per second and B is worth 0.5, so A is better on that metric alone. Several things would change the answer. If A's cycle time is measured optimistically and the real alignment time pushes it to 12 seconds, A falls to 0.5 and the two tie. If A requires a mechanism that costs five weeks to build and B requires one week, the schedule may favor B. If the field gets congested near the high goal in real matches, A's effective cycle time rises while B's does not. Points per second ranks actions; it does not by itself pick the strategy.
3. Requirement or Constraint: Classify each of the following and explain why the classification matters: (a) the robot must fit the starting size limit, (b) the robot must score in the high goal, (c) the team will use mecanum wheels.
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(a) is a constraint, sourced from the game manual. It cannot be negotiated, and a design that violates it is dead regardless of its other merits.
(b) is a requirement, derived from the team's strategy. If the high goal turns out to be unreachable in the time available, the requirement can be dropped and the strategy revised.
(c) is neither: it is a preference stated as though it were a constraint. It is a solution, and putting it in the constraint list eliminates tank and swerve drivetrains before anyone compares them.
The classification matters because it determines what happens when the design fails to satisfy the statement. Constraints kill designs; requirements can be renegotiated; preferences should be questioned.
4. Generating and Judging: Why should the generating and judging phases of a brainstorm be separated in time, and what specifically goes wrong when they are not?
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When judging happens during generation, the second or third idea gets criticized publicly, and people stop offering ideas rather than risk the same treatment. The group converges on whatever was proposed first by whoever has the most standing, which is not an engineering process. Separating them lets quantity build first. Bad ideas are still valuable during generation: they define the edges of the solution space, and they frequently contain one component that improves a different concept.
5. Recording Rejections: Your team chose an active roller intake and rejected three other concepts. Why is it worth writing down the rejected ones with reasons, given that you are not building them?
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Two reasons. First, judges directly ask why a design was chosen, and the strength of the answer depends on being able to show what it was chosen over. Second, and more practically, the chosen concept sometimes fails late in the season. When it does, the annotated list of rejected concepts is the fastest available path to a replacement, because the analysis has already been done and only needs rechecking against what you have since learned.
II. Review the Process
A team describes its season as follows. Identify the 2 process errors and state what should have happened instead.
Week 1 Read the game manual once as a team. Agreed the high goal
was the priority. Someone suggested a linear slide with a
claw; everyone liked it, so that became the plan.
Week 2-6 Built the slide and claw out of machined aluminum. Took
longer than expected because of the custom brackets.
Week 7 First test. The claw grips the element reliably, but it
takes about 4 seconds to align the robot before the claw
closes, so a full cycle is 14 seconds instead of the 8
seconds the team assumed.
Week 8 Team decides to keep the mechanism because of the amount
of work already invested, and to practice driving faster.
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Error 1 - No alternatives were generated. One concept was proposed in week one and adopted because the group liked it. There was nothing to compare it against, so the team never learned whether a funnel, a roller intake, or a passive design would have had a shorter alignment time. The fix is a generating block producing several concepts, a constraint screen, and rough prototypes of the top two before committing.
Week 1 Generate 6 concepts, screen against constraints,
prototype the top 2 in cardboard and scrap.
Error 2 - The competition version was built before the concept was tested. Six weeks of machined aluminum went in before anyone measured a cycle time. The 8 second assumption, which was the entire basis of the strategy, went unchecked until week seven. A rough prototype in week two would have exposed the 4 second alignment problem while there was still time to change the concept.
Week 2 Rough prototype, measure real cycle time,
compare against the 8 s requirement.
On the week 8 decision: keeping the mechanism because of the work already invested is the sunk cost trap. The hours spent are gone either way; the only question is which robot scores more in the remaining weeks. That question should be answered on its merits, not on the investment.
III. Scored Check
The questions above are for working something through. These are graded, so you can find out whether it stuck. Everything is scored in your browser.
// module-00/mastery-quiz.check
Scored Check
5 questions. 80% to pass. Answers are graded in your browser and nothing is submitted anywhere.
1. A scoring action is worth 6 points and takes 9 seconds. Another is worth 2 points and takes 4 seconds. Which is the better target on points per second alone?
2. Which of these is a constraint rather than a requirement?
3. Why should the generating and judging phases of a brainstorm be separated?
4. A prototype takes two weeks to build. What is the main problem with that?
5. Your team rejected three intake concepts. Why write down the reasons?
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