About Me

Gavin Hughes
    My name is Gavin Hughes and I am a passionate Creative Engineer! I love creating games, being hands on, and developing unique solutions to strange problems! I also deeply enjoy spending time with friends, watching YouTube videos, and a bit of acting!

    I grew up in the Texas Coastal Bend Area and will graduate from the University of Texas at Austin as a Mechanical Engineering Major with an Elements of Computing Certificate and a minor in Entrepreneurship!

    As I'm sure you will see looking around, I create many projects in different interests which I try and collect together to show on my YouTube Channel and now on this website as well! I'm also very curious by nature and would love to hear about other people's projects, so join my Discord or shoot me an Email about what you've been working on recently! ๐Ÿ‘€
    With my strong background in creative problem solving, I've always been intrigued by the new and what is accomplishable in the STEM field. I continuously strive to break boundaries with big, innovative ideas and projects in whatever opportunity I land next! โš™๏ธ๐Ÿงช

Topic

My Hobbies!

My Hobbies!

    Hanging out with my friends is a great way I spend my time whether it be on Discord playing Lethal Company or Minecraft or hanging out in person going to the local Spirit Halloween or celebrating a Birthday! You can always count on friends to lift you up after a stressful day.

    Most of my friends right now are in my theater org, but I still hold some from back in high school and hope to find more as I go through life. Each have their own stories, experiences, and skills that I deeply enjoy hearing about and supporting them when they need it.

    I may not at all times have a large amount of friends, but that's the way I like it with a chosen few close to me as I go through life! I would not be where I am without them and their support!
    YouTube has always been a constant source in my life whether that be for inspiration, entertainment, learning about my favorite games, or even vlogging the projects I work on!

    I've had a few favorite YouTubers over the years including Jacksepticeye, Mumbo Jumbo, and Game Theory, but my current favorite is AstralSpiff!

    He plays games in the horror category but often puts a spin on it including Speedrunning which puts a different perspective on the relationship between the Game, Player, and Game Developer. They're also very long, calming videos that I can watch after a long day! โ˜•
    Oh boy, theater... What a wild ride it's been. I've participated in theater on and off since junior high and the people and the laughs are what I always come back for! Everyone there always arrives on their A-game and bring so much energy and wackiness to every rehearsal.

    For the University Theatre Guild, I've participated in 5 Children's Shows and my first musical: Trail to Oregon! One the best plays I've seen and been apart of! ๐Ÿ‚

    Will I continue theater once I've graduated? Who knows? It always somehow creeps back into my life and I meet some amazing people!
    Everyday, anytime I work, I am guaranteed to be listening to music! It gets me in the groove and helps me focus on the task I'm doing. Even right now I'm listening to music, specifically The Struts!

    My music tastes have changed over the years from popular pop and alternative rock, to video game soundtracks and fan songs, to some emotional songs about growing up and life as we know it.

    Some of my favorite artists over the years have been Imagine Dragons, Or3o, Derivakat, Gooseworx, and The Living Tombstone. The Living Tombstone being my favorite as I tried to achieve the #1 spot on Spotify Wrapped the same year I saw them perform live in Austin!
    My favorite game I would have to say is Minecraft. I've played it since I was a child on my tablet and still keep up with it to this day even though I'm not able to play it as much.

    Every Wednesday, I keep on eye out for the latest Minecraft snapshot update to see what's new for features, optimizations, and developer features. Here's to hoping that they eventually allow full creative freedom of their game through Datapacks! I would love to take on a creative project modifying the game to what I desire! I've already collected a list of ideas... ๐Ÿ‘€

Why Engineering?

    Being a Mechanical Engineer has been a dream of mine since elementary school when first asked what career I would be interested in. The ability to be hands on designing a problem to a solution inundated with creativity and problem solving sounds like the perfect place for me!

    Because of this, I went into University to learn Mechanical Engineering and man has there been some ups and downs. However, being here has given me the perfect place to learn and hone my skills! Below is a collection of my many engineering projects!

(WIP) Sprinkler System for Fire Hydrants
Spring 2025

    For my Senior Design Project class, we are working for Make It Rain Wildfire to improve upon and invent new systems for an emergency sprinkler system attached to fire hydrants. The goal of this system is to prevent flying embers from wildfires igniting someone's property!

    This project also includes the legality, ease of use, and installation cost which has required a lot of research so far.

    This project is not yet finished, so check back later!

(WIP) Automatic Can Opener
Spring 2025

    For my Robot Mechanism Design class, we must design a complex robot that can achieve a goal using 4 bar mechanisms. For our project, we have chosen to make an automatic can opener that can cut the top off.

    This project is not yet finished, so check back later!

(WIP) Talons of Acquisition
2021 - 2025

    I am currently in the Robotics & Automation Society in the Demobots subcommittee where we create robots for the fun of it! While in the subcommittee, I've been helping to complete a claw machine! I have now become the lead of said robot since then.

    The goal is to make a claw machine that can be customized later to demonstrate to elementary and incoming students the wonders of STEM and robotics!

    This project is not yet finished, so check back later!

Texas Robo Rumble
Spring 2024

    I signed up for a Battle Bots competition! You heard that right! Within a couple months, we had to design, build, and battle our own bots in a double-elimination bracket.

    I was the main one on CAD and designed the body of the bot. A couple design factors I thought crucial for the body is: 1. Being able to be flipped over which is why the body isn't that tall so the wheels could stick out on either side and 2. Having a secondary offense mechanism of a ramp.

    One of the most difficult parts was getting the weapon machined as MechE's Machine Shop Staff was incredibly unhelpful however someone from Texas Inventionworks helped us out. Unfortunately, our motor ended up being flipped for the weapon which caused it to self-destruct. HOWEVER, my ramp design worked, and we won a battle while we fixed our main weapon. We ended up winning 5th overall! My next semester we ended up building the same robot for our Design Methodology class and did a lot of improvements and analysis to the design.

RC Race Car
Spring 2024

    For my Machine Elements class, our task was to design, test, and race an RC car. This proved to be quite the challenge due to us having to design a gearbox and turning mechanism from scratch with little help from the professor and TAs.

    After a lot of research and prototyping we were able to come up with the design shown here. As this class also discussed deflection and fatigue, we did an FEA analysis both for the axle and upon impact as well as hand calculations for different stress conditions.

    From our analysis results and not wanting to damage our steering mechanism, we added a front ramming bar to protect ourselves. Unfortunately, during competition our servo horn got stripped and we had to quickly replace it but we could only turn right which was the opposite way of the track. Shows how important quality assurance is and how to design a better steering mechanism for next time!

Carlos, The 6-Legged Rover
Spring 2022

    One day I decided, today I'm going to build my own robot and so I did! I was inspired by the K'NEX Spider Bot toy I has as a child and wanted to recreate it using the lasercutters and printers I was now trained for at Texas Inventionworks.

    I modeled it in Fusion360 as it's the CAD software I was most familar with at the time and then built and assembled it within the span of a semester. The thing I unnexpectedly had the most trouble with was the servos as I accidentally bought limited 180ยฐ servos, so I had to take them apart and unattach the potentiometer.

    After building it, I showed to my friends to see how they would respond to it as I had put two sound sensors on the front but the robot ended up being too loud and too slow for the sounds sensors to do anything. Next time could be interesting to try it with distance sensors and have it stop every couple seconds to sense motion and move towards it. Watch my YouTube Vlog for more details!

Supernova Fidget Spinner
Fall 2021

    For one of my first classes in university, I was tasked with designing, fabricating, and making a full report for a fidget spinner project. This involved sending sketches, bill of materials, conducting an FEA analysis of a drop test, and setting up a CAM operation to create a mold for the fidget spinners.

    For the designing of the Fidget Spinner, I was tasked with learning and using Solidworks which deemed to be a lot more challenging than anticipated with the organic shape I had in mind. The sketches and FEA tests were done in Solidworks with the CAM setup being done in Fusion360.

    The central piece was 3D printed and friction fit with the main body being made using injection molding. It suprisingly turned out exactly how I planned and I never had to sacrifice the design due to it being too complicated for any of the processes the assignments asked for.

Programming

You can find my updates on big game ideas in my Big Game Updates YouTube Playlist,
my demo ideas in my Cool Game Demos playlist,
and downloads to all my available games on my Itch.io site!
Website is still Work in Progress ๐Ÿ”ง

Other Projects

All of my projects are most likely on my YouTube Channel!
My favorites are all collected in the My BEST Videos playlist!
Website is still Work in Progress ๐Ÿ”ง

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