I feel like “mechanism complexity” isn’t a very solid unit of measurement. Instead of deciding how “complex” something will end up being, you should try and predict how capable your team is, and if they are able to accomplish whatever they are setting out to do. Capability and Ability are both subjective terms, but if I were to try and put numbers into it, it might look like this:
challenge: The level of difficulty your project has. Challenge will be calculated like this. if you are calculating a full robot’s score, do this for every subsystem independently, then add it all together
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+X for every production technique (hardware or software) that someone doesn’t already know. If a mentor understands the technique to a degree of instructing a student, only add +1. If the student must learn this independently, add +7
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+1 for every production sub-team that gets involved with the project. Example: if your project requires mechanical, electrical, and pneumatics; +3 challenge score
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+1 for every software subsystem that gets involved. If your project needs vision software and autonomous programming, +2 challenge score
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-1 for each process that is repeated elsewhere. If you are designing a part that requires a custom part, the first time would get +3 for using a unique system. However each time the same part is used again elsewhere, it is -1 due to the process already being mastered.
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after all calculations are done, add +20 no matter what because designing and building something new is difficult, no matter the prerequisite skill
After you have the challenge score, try to get an idea for your team’s Capability by estimating these numbers on a scale of 1-10.
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How helpful would anyone’s prior knowledge be (prior meaning if someone’s personal or job experience could assist here)?
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How comfortable are students with learning new things?
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How well will your team be able to handle unexpected problems related to the design and production of your project?
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How well does your team manage time?
For each of the above fields, apply this rule: 1 = -5; 2-4 = -1; 5 = +0; 6-7 = +1; 8-9 = +3; 10 = +5 and total the results of each question into one Capability score.
For Ability, combine the results of the following questions. Yes = +1, No = -1
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(only count if applicable to project) has anyone [student or mentor] learned how to use whatever machinery needed for production?
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Can a mentor help the process along?
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Does documentation exist for whatever you are attempting?
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Does the student already understand the principles behind what they are doing?
And after all of those things are calculated/estimated, you can sort of get an idea of how easy a task will be. In general:
If Challenge > Capability + Ability, it won’t be easy, but not impossible.
If Challenge = Capability + Ability, you should be able to make it through just fine, but it will take effort
If Challenge < Capability + Ability, it should be smooth sailing.
Of course, these aren’t real numbers, or real summarizations. I made this concept up just now, but the only thing that is 100% usable is the general concept of “is the idea of your project more or less difficult to do and understand than your team’s ability to understand new concepts as well as their actual ability to preform the necessary tasks”. The actual numbers I just made are completely arbitrary, a guesstimate based on my experience learning robotics-fu.
Everything that we practice in robotics are all learnable concepts, it just depends on the time and effort your students are willing to put in. That’s not to say some things aren’t worth the time or effort, but that’s up for you to decide.