Jimmy Fowler

Personal website and portfolio

Project maintained by jimmyfowler Hosted on GitHub Pages

About Me

Hello!

My name is James Fowler, but I go by Jimmy. I’m a student at the University of Washington studying Aeronautical & Astronautical Engineering. I’ve always had a thing for space and initially planned to study astrophysics. But after seeing that engineers can make hands-on, tangible contributions towards space exploration, I couldn’t imagine a future where I’m doing anything else. Though cosmology still has a special place in my heart, I want to be a part of the mission to explore our solar system, attain lunar permanence, set foot on Mars, and see what kinds of resources we can find on asteroids and icy moons to improve our lives on & off planet Earth.

I love coding, CADing and control theory, and am currently looking for opportunities to apply those to space exploration!

Portfolio

Technical Skills: MATLAB, Python, C++, PCB Design (KiCAD), CAD (Solidworks + NX)

» What I’m Workin on Now « click it!

Education

Internships

SLS Rocket Propulsion Hardware Intern @ Boeing (Septemeber - December 2024)

New Shepard System Architecture Intern @ Blue Origin (June - September 2024)

Configuration Aerodynamics Intern @ Boeing (June - September 2023)

Part-time Work (to help pay for school)

Web Developer @ The Academy of Lacey (March 2022 - Present)

Projects

Controlling an Autonomous Paraglider

Information on this project coming soon!

AIMduino (August 2023 - Present)

Context

Telescope

I bought this Bushnell Voyager Sky Tour 900mm x 4.5” Reflector Telescope at a garage sale for $5 (what a steal!), but it’s missing a couple of parts: the two lesser magnifying of the three eyepieces, the dial for fine altitude (vertical) adjustment, the handset meant to guide you with audio, and the finderscope… all items that help me aim the telescope at my celestial target. I could fix this with $200+ in replacement parts, or I could engineer my own alignment system and add functionality that would otherwise be impossible! I’m calling it AIMduino (working title)… Here’s the plan:

It will go through some design iterations with check-in points:

I thought this could make a super fun project that would allow me to apply my Arduino and coding knowledge, learn more about mechanical design and telescopes, and upgrade mine for relatively cheap!

Status Report

TRL: 3 I’ve tested the stepper motor (Nema 17) and driver board (A4988) and I’ve been cooking up some code to control it!

Here is my current (primitive) version of the code to control azimuth orientation:

// This program takes a target azimuth from user input from the serial monitor
// and steps the motor to that position in the most efficient direction.
// Assumes initially at 0 degrees
// Azimuth is measured clockwise from true north, 0 - 360 degrees


// set step and direction pins
const int stepPin = 10; 
const int dirPin = 11; 
const float deg_step = 0.1125; // 1.8 degrees per step but 1/16 step w/ microstepping = 0.1125 deg per step
const int speed = 10; // (1 to 10) edit to change step speed
const int step_delay = 5000/speed; 

void setup() {
  Serial.begin(9600);
  // Sets the two pins as Outputs
  pinMode(stepPin,OUTPUT); 
  pinMode(dirPin,OUTPUT);
}

void loop() {

  Serial.println("Enter Target Azimuth");

  // wait until user input is detected
  while (Serial.available() == 0) {
  }

  float target_Az = Serial.parseFloat();  // put user input into target azimuth var
  // float current_Az = ...
  int target_steps = round(target_Az / deg_step); // convert to steps (degrees divided by degrees-per-step = steps)

  if (target_Az > 360 || target_Az < 0) { // invalid azimuth
    Serial.println("Please enter a valid azimuth between 0 and 360 degrees");

  } else if (target_Az <= 180) { // azimuth between 0 and 180
      digitalWrite(dirPin,LOW); // clockwise
      for(int x = 0; x < target_steps; x++) {
        digitalWrite(stepPin,HIGH); 
        delayMicroseconds(step_delay); 
        digitalWrite(stepPin,LOW); 
        delayMicroseconds(step_delay); 
      }

  } else if (target_Az > 180){
      digitalWrite(dirPin,HIGH); // counterclockwise
      for(int x = 0; x < 3200 - target_steps; x++) {
        digitalWrite(stepPin,HIGH); 
        delayMicroseconds(step_delay); 
        digitalWrite(stepPin,LOW); 
        delayMicroseconds(step_delay); 
      }
  }
}

Next step: Begin mechanical design of the hardware to rotate the telescope (I’ll be using Siemens NX)

Learning Arduino (June - September 2023)

Arduino Kit

Over the Summer, I completed six Arduino projects led by a starter kit book. The goal was to learn circuit design and coding with a variety of instruments and solidify my passion for Arduino.

Some circuit elements & devices I worked with:

CADing Perseverance

At the end of my course on CAD & Visual Communication, we were prompted to model an original assembly of our choice. It was open-ended, but we had to include everything we learned in the class. I chose to model NASA’s Mars Perseverance Rover. Even though I kept to a relatively low level of detail, this project was an incredible undertaking, especially while handling other finals.

What I wanted was something that looked mildly realistic, and had some realistic mechanical motion.

Rover Render

I utilized a plethora of mates between each of the 18 parts, and followed best practices while modeling each indiviudal part, and while putting them all together in the assembly.

Here’s the project assignment description for more details on requirements. Below that is a .zip with my assembly file and all part files and drawings. Feel free to check it out for yourself!

Final Project Spring 2023.pdf

Fowler_J_FINAL_Rover.zip

Building an RV-12 (May 2023 - Present) (Husky Flying Club)

I am currently leading a team of 6 engineers to machine and assemble aircraft parts. I Conduct & coordinate team meetings and allocate work to other student engineers on the project. I’m also planning & writing operations & legal documents with an experienced aerospace lawyer.

Freewing (December 2022 - April 2023) (Husky Flying Club)

During my Freshman year with the Husky Flying Club, I helped build a freewing canard, radio-controlled aircraft with a ten-foot wingspan costing $3500 in parts. I helped organize our engineers into subteams based on interests and experience and then participated in weekly build meetings to construct the aircraft. I also wrote 8 pages of legal documents in order to safely and legally test-fly our plane once it was built.