Sigmaringen

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A couple photos I uploaded can be seen here.

Reutlingen university has a ‘students4students’ initiative where they link up local students to help out exchange students. One of the students4students, Jens (also linked with  Erasmus) organised a trip for us to Sigmaringen. We took a tour of the castle and then a 5km walk along the Danube River and back.

We caught the train just before 9am arriving in Sigmaringen shortly after 10, a group of about 45. We walked straight to the castle to start a tour through the public area. The castle is privately owned and the owner still lives in a large section of the castle. This was unfortunately as it meant we were only allowed through the guided tour section of the castle, but weren’t allowed to explore any further or roam the grounds.

The tour itself was very nice. A very knowledgeable guide took us through many rooms. All beautifully decorated and including many ornaments, paintings and tapestries that were hundreds of years old. Unfortunately because of all these valuable ornaments and heirlooms, no photography was allowed in the building, we assume for fear of someone doing a re-con to break-in at a later stage.

A walk through the town and a small market led us to a hill overlooking the town. Down the other side and through a bit more of the town and we came out by the Danube River. The Danube River is Europe’s second biggest river after the Volga. Sigmaringen however is very near the source of the river and as such the river isn’t particularly impressive, gaining size from many tributaries along its way to the Black Sea.

The weather was absolutely stunning, and we did a 5km walk upstream all along the river. There’s a nice path which was being used by lots of other people including cyclists. We had taken our time walking out of town, and stopped quite a few times. Also crossed a bridge called the Teufelsbrücke and went to a viewing point over some farmlands and the river.

But on the way back we had to get back to Sigmaringen in time for our train so a brisk walk back along the river and through town got us to the station with 10min to spare. A peaceful trip back to Reutlingen and a nice supper at a restaurant called deja vu was all needed to complete the day.

Photo: Jens

Without any other plans at the moment, I’ll have to decide what to do next. A weekend in Reutlingen to get some work done on my thesis may be what’s required.

Cannstatter Volksfest / Wasen

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I seriously took a lot of photos. Close to 1000 possibly. I’ve scratched two thirds of them, and have uploaded about 100 to Google Drive.

The Canstatter Volksfest which takes place in Stuttgart every year is like a mini-Oktoberfest. I say mini in that it’s about half the size, receiving about 3 million visitors a year compared to Munich’s 6+. But it’s a very similar setup. Carnival type atmosphere with roller coasters, games and stalls. Just with the addition of the massive beer tents.

Me and my roommate Wu Di

Much like in Munich, the tents are open to the public all day until 16:00, when people with reserved tables are permitted in. In Munich we were part of the public, whereas in Stuttgart we had reserved tables. Baldur Veit, the Director of the International Office at Reutlingen University had organised with one of the big breweries for semi-sponsored tickets and reserved places on the last day of the event.

Last year there were 1500 students that attended the event, I don’t know the stats this year, but the 2000 tickets made available were sold out, some people bought more than one ticket, and also invited friends form outside the university. This year we had place in the Fürstenberg tent which holds about 2800 people.

We arrived at about 15:00 at the festival and walked around a bit before entering the tent and trading in our coupons. The setup was very similar to the tent in Munich with rows and rows of benches and tables spread out around a central stage. One difference only getting to the tent at 16:00 meant that we had live music being played almost throughout the night, till we left shortly before 22:00. This was opposite to our relatively quiet morning experience in Munich. Security also didn’t seem to have too much of an issue with people standing on benches, as the entire crowd spent most of the evening. The only acceptable reason to do this in Munich was when you were going to down your maß.

The festivals are very similar. It’s difficult to say whether one is better than the other. There are definitely more people in Munich, this could be felt just walking through the grounds. For most of us, Stuttgart was a more enjoyable experience. We only had a 1 hour train trip there and back, and the tent was filled with like minded students. I’d like to experience a reserved place in Munich one day, but if you only get the opportunity to go to one of the festivals, I wouldn’t say you’re missing out on much.

I preferred the Augustinebrau beer to Furstenburg’s, on the other hand it’s only 9 Euro for a Maß in Stuttgart as opposed to 10 in Munich, and the half chickens we got in Stuttgart also came with a breadroll, something that was lacking in Munich.

Member of Joe William’s Band who sang “Give me Hope Jo-anna“

It’s difficult to know what else to say. The live music (Joe William’s Band) and hordes of students definitely made the event more enjoyable for us. As we waited at the train station some fireworks lit up the sky. We got home on time and even managed to catch the last bus home. Something we’ve struggled to do in two previous trips.

Next week Saturday the local Erasmus organisation has organised a trip for us to Sigmaringen so I’ll probably spend the day there.

Autonomous Guided Vehicle Master’s Project

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In February this year I started work on my MEng Mechatronics degree at NMMU in Port Elizabeth. The current title for the project is “The Design of a Low-Cost Autonomous Guided Cart (AGC) for Material Handling”. The project was initially suggested through a collaboration of my department and the General Motors factory in PE.

I’ve barely posted any details during the year, I’m never quite sure where I stand with IP, as far as I know I own none of it, and the university owns it all. In any case, as part of the South African Automotive Week held in Port Elizabeth this week, our department had a stand and apparently a video similar to what can be seen below is on show there. I feel that’s more than enough to cover me posting the video here.

There are similar products available on the market, but they are very costly, I’m aiming at my product being less than R30,000 (US$3,500) per unit. Obviously this is a pure cost per unit value, and doesn’t take into account development costs that a normal project would invoke.

There were a list of specifications that had to be met, I’ll post my thesis early next year some time, as with any project, but the budget was definitely the limiting factor. There are lots of nice toys you can put into such a project, such as an R11,000 (cheapest I could find) laser range finder, alas. Finding suitable motors and drivers is also rather tricky.

I initially (and still do) wanted to use a microcontroller. After discussion with several staff members I was pretty much instructed to use a PLC. I understand that the application lends itself to PLCs, but I’m far more comfortable with microcontroller and the cost cutting effect would be significant.

In any case, the video shows some of the testing I did at the GM factory. Control is a bit iffy at the moment, I didn’t research my PLC choice well enough before selecting it. I have a few ideas in mind to improve this, unfortunately I’m in Germany till mid-December (well not really unfortunately) so I’m only going to have a week or two to make changes to my AGV before I have to hand in my thesis.

A bit of Strasbourg, a bit of Rallye de France and a lot of trains

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I had to cut down the photos quite a lot, but there are still over 100. Can be seen here.

Before I came to Germany I checked out the F1 and WRC calendars for the months that I’d be here. While I ran out of luck on the F1 front, the WRC Rallye de France Alsace was taking place while here. And not that far away, just across the French/German border, due West of Reutlingen.

SS19

A week before the rally I started asking around to find out if anyone else was interested and got a few responses. Looking in to getting to the rally was a bit trickier though. The rally was about 180km away, buses didn’t go at appropriate times, and were similarly priced to trains, fairly expensive. Looking at over 100 Euros for a return ticket on the fast trains. And that was only a trip to Strasbourg, never mind trying to get to the stages themselves.

SS21 – left: Loeb (won the rally, and thus his 9th championship) – right: Solberg

A car rental would have been ideal, but the agents in Reutlingen don’t keep great hours on weekends, meaning complicated arrangements and collecting a car in Stuttgart, this linked with expensive rates meant that we were left with our old friend the Schone Wochenende train ticket.

SS21 – left: Atkinson – right: Hirvonen

I asked a few friends if they were interested in going, and before I knew it, we had a group of 13 people walking to Reutlingen train station at 05:30 on Sunday morning. Not all specifically interested in the rally, but interested in travelling a bit. Four hours of trains got us to Strasbourg where we had to take another train to Haguenau, the scene of stage 19. The stage was taking place in the town, and as soon as we walked out the station we saw thousands of spectators. First thing to notice, people with ladders. Lots of them. Apparently veteran rally spectators know how difficult it can be to see the track.

8 Russians, 1 Belgian, 1 Brazilian, 1 Jordanian, 1 South African, 1 Swede

We spent almost two hours there and grabbed some lunch. Then hopped on another train to Bischwiller, another small French town. A short walk to the edge of town led us to stage 21 where we spent the next two hours. We managed to get there before the stage started, so could get a decent spot.

Although it was great to be at an official WRC event, with the top drivers and cars, I think the lack of spectators and barriers back home mean I can get better photos in SA :P

European Union Buildings

After that another train back to Strasbourg. We had hoped to catch the closing ceremony in Strasbourg, but couldn’t find it, so instead opted for a walk to the European Parliament buildings. I found Strasbourg extremely beautiful, lovely old buildings all the way through. We had to stop in front of the Russian, Belgian and Swedish consulates for photos for the respective citizens. Eventually we made it to parliament where we had a look round for a while.

European Union Parliament

Two tram rides back to the train station, grabbed some supper and had to make a mad dash for the train back to Germany. 3 hours later and a late train, we were about to miss a connection. Another mad dash, and fear about missing both trains, and we were lucky enough to make it home just after midnight.