Hi all,
I’ve had a few teachers ask me about the electromagnet used with the robot arm. The magnet will pick up a disk regardless of if it’s set to boost or not. They wonder if that defeats the purpose of coding to boost/drop and the students are frustrated. Is there something we’re missing here?
Thanks!
Great question! As you note, the electromagnet is always magnetic regardless of whether it is powered or not. Even when not plugged into the Brain, you will see that it can attract a disk when it makes contact.
However, when the current flows through it, the magnetic force is either increased or decreased depending on the polarity. When increased (boost), you can collect the disk without contacting it. And when using drop, the magnetic force is reduced enough for the disk to drop off.
What you have observed is part of the reason that the commands are Boost and Drop rather than Collect and Drop.
@Mike_Bothwell I would make sure to address this with the teacher - why are the students getting frustrated? What is the goal of the lesson, what are we actually trying to do and learn? Moreover, students are exploring Robotic Arms - which is a direct tie to factory automation. This opens up a whole new area for students (and the teacher) to learn and explore. For example, the teacher can ask the students, “How is amazon able to deliver packages the next day?”
This is all due to factory automation - a fascinating topic that are students interact with every day. This is also a great starting point for a discussion of Artificial Intelligence.
So, @Chris_Calver provided a great explanation for the commands, but additionally, please make sure to follow up to provide additional context. And if you want more info or have more questions, this is a great place to ask 
Thanks for this, @Jason_McKenna!
