Advanced Remote Monitoring and Operated Recon Device

1
Advanced Remote Monitoring and Operated Recon
Device

• Andrew Lichenstein
• Kevin Jadunandan
• Thomas Kehr

2
Motivation

• Dragon Runner surveillance robot
• Extremely Durable
• Fast and lightweight platform
• 32,000 per unit
• Objectives
• Fraction of the Price(lt 2000)
• Withstand drop of two stories
• Maneuverability on all terrains
• Wireless Control/Video
• iPhone Control

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Hardware Block Diagram
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Specifications
Locomotion
Body
Low High Units
Length 1 2 Feet
Width 1 2 Feet
Height ¼ ¾ Feet
Weight 5 15 Lbs
Low High Units
Peak Speed 3 5 MPH
Wheel Size 5 10 Inches
Motor RPM 200 340 RPM
Turn Radius 0 5 Degrees
Battery Life
Operating Voltage
Low High Units
High Usage ½ 1 Hours
Low Usage 1 4 Hours
Low High Units
Motor Battery 12 24 Volts
Control Battery 9 12 Volts
Communication
Low High Units
Video Frame Rate 20 30 FPS
Operating Distance 15 100 Feet
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Chassis

• Raw Material Selection
• Suspension
• Body Design
• Polyurea
• Component Mounting
• Camera

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Chassis Raw Material Selection

• Aluminum
• Low-cost
• Light weight
• High cost of manipulation
• Fiberglass Composite
• Extremely low cost
• Easily manipulated
• High Strength
• Experienced with fabrication
• Permeable to Radio frequencies

• Carbon Fiber
• High cost
• High Strength
• Complex manipulation

Fiberglass Carbon Fiber Aluminum
Ultimate Strength (MPa) 3,450 5,650 40-50
Yield Strength (MPa) N/A N/A 15-20
Density (g/cm3) 2.57 1.75 2.7
Average Price (/ft) 0.91 13.80 7.50
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Chassis Suspension

• Aluminum Frame 1/8 Aluminum Sheet
• Provide mounting for components
• No metal on metal rubber washers
• Spring Suspension System
• 32 Springs
• 8 Motor Clamps

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Chassis Body Design

• Fiberglass-Composite Construction
• Clam-Shell Design
• Plug and Mold Fabrication
• Accommodate Peripherals

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Chassis Body Design

• Ventilation and Cooling
• 4 12V Micro CPU Fans
• 2 Intake 2 Outtake
• Component Mounting
• Spring Suspension
• No Metal Contact

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Chassis Polyurea

• Truck Bed Liner
• Rhino Liner, etc.
• Extreme Durability
• 41 MPa Tensile Strength
• Quick Reaction Time
• Build up Multiple Layers
• Explosive and Ballistic resistance

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Drive Train

• Geared Motor
• Wheels and Locomotion

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Drive Train Motor Selection

• IG42 Geared Motor
• 241 Gear Ratio
• 24V DC
• 252 rpm
• 2300mA
• 10 kgf-cm Torque

1.75
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Drive Train Wheels and Locomotion

• Wheels
• Wheel Tire
• 10 Diameter
• Custom Mounting Hardware
• Wheel Speed
• Speed (fpm) (Diameter of wheel (in) x p x rpm
  of motor) /12
• (10 x p x 252) /12 659.7 ft/m
• 7.59 mph

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Power System

• Batteries
• Control Battery
• Drive Battery

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Power System Batteries

• NiMH Rechargeable Packs
• 24V 4500 mAHr
• Drive Battery
• 12V 4000 mAHr
• Control Battery

10" x 2" x 2"
5" x 2" x 2"
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Power System Control Battery
Component Current Draw Operating Voltage Power Consumption
XBee Pro 55ma 3.3V 0.18 Watts
Falcom FSA03 40ma 3.3V 0.132 Watts
PIC18F4520 200ma 5V 1 Watt
Wireless Camera 500ma 9V 4.5 Watts
Total 795ma 5.812 Watts
Capacity 4000mAHr Current Drain of system
795mA Estimated battery life 5 hrs
Regulators of 3.3V, 5V, and 9V are used to power
the main logic and peripheral devices of ARMORD
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Power System Drive Battery
Component Current Draw Operating Voltage Power Consumption
IG42 Geared Motor 2300mA 24V 55.2Watts
Battery Capacity 4.5 A Hr Current Draw 2300mA
x 4 9.2 A Battery Life 29.3 minutes
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Video System Camera

• 380-lines resolution
• 150-foot range (no obstacles)
• 2.4 GHz output frequency
• Built-in microphone

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Internal Hardware

• MCU
• GPS
• Communication
• Motor Controller

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Internal Hardware MCU

• Features our group looked for in MCU
• CPU Speed gt 4MIPS (10 MIPS)
• Program Memory gt 16KB (32KB)
• Internal Oscillator gt 4MHz (16MHz)
• IO Pins gt 15 (30)
• ADC gt 2 (15)
• Program in C/C using MPLAB IDE
• Temperature Range (-40 to 125 C)
• PDIP
• PIC18F4520 Max Specs in ()

PIC18F4520
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Internal Hardware MCU

• Communication is the most essential part of our
  robot, we will need to be sending and receiving
  data from our Gateway to be able to control our
  robot. We will be using the USART pins on the
  MCU, which allows us to send serial data.
• Our MCU will need to be data parsing when it
  receives GPS updates which come in the form of a
  string of data. We will be emulating the
  hardware by using software USART, which is also
  know as bit-banging.
• Motor Control will be done by having two
  variables set , one for the left motors and one
  for the right motors. We will be sending a value
  of 0 to 255, which will tell which motor to move
  and how which direction it should spin the motor.
  This also will be using software USART.
• Battery life testing will be done using AD
  Converters, so we will know when the battery is
  running low.

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Communication Options

• XBee vs. XBee Pro vs. Bluetooth Class 1

XBee XBee Pro Bluetooth Class 1
Indoor Range Up to 100ft Up to 300ft Up to 330 ft
Outdoor/LOS Up to 300ft Up to 1 Mile Up to 330 ft
Data Rate 250Kbps 250Kbps Up to 3 Mb/s
Unit Price 22.95 37.95 59.95
The Bluetooth was a bit to expensive and the
regular XBee distance was a bit to small. This
is why we chose the XBee Pro which was a good
combination of both data rate and distance. We
really only need 300 to 400 ft max for our
application.
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Internal Hardware GPS

• We originally were looking at the Copernicus GPS
  Module that was sold on Sparkfun, but after
  talking with other sources they pointed out to me
  the Falcom FSA03 unit. Here are the details of
  the unit

Copernicus Falcom
Cold Start 39 sec 29 sec
Hot Start 9 sec lt1 sec
Antenna Not Included Attached
Update Rate 1Hz 4Hz
Channel 12 32
One of the best features of this chips is that it
has a Sarantel helical antenna which lets you
orient this GPS any way you would like , so you
dont have to make it point towards the sky.
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Communication GPS Purpose

• The GPSs main purpose was to be sending latitude
  and longitude to our microcontroller so that we
  could use this data with our iPhone application.
  The GPS sends NMEA(National Marine Electronics
  Association) data to our MCU here is an example
  of what it looks like
• GPGLL,4916.45,N,12311.12,W,225444,A,1D
• As you can see the data that is sent is not an
  easy to read format so our MCU will parse the
  data needed and send to a variable that will be
  sent out via XBee.

Geographic Lat Lon
123o11.12
Data Active
Time(UTC)
Checksum
49o16.45
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Motor Controller Selection

• Originally we were thinking of creating our own
  motor controller using PNP BJTs but due to the
  fact we wanted stability and more features we
  decided to buy the Sabertooth 10A Dual Motor
  Controllers. One of the key features that we
  really liked as a group was that it is a
  regenerative motor driver, so when the robot
  stops or reverses it recharges the batteries with
  the wasted energy. It also has over current and
  thermal protection which means we wont have to
  worry about damaging the motor controllers.

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Motor Controller Setup

• In our setup we will be using two motor
  controllers in parallel. So we will be using one
  pin on our MCU a Tx line that uses software USART
  that connects to the S1 ports on the motor
  controllers.
• The Tx line on the MCU will transmit to both of
  the motor controllers S1 lines at the same time.
  We will be sending values of 0 to 255 to the
  motor controllers .
• A value of 1 to 127 controls the left motors and
  a value of 128 to 255 controls the right motors

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MCU Software Diagram
RECEIVE THREAD
SEND THREAD
DATA STRUCTURES
-Left Motor -Right Motor -GPSLat -GPSLon -BatteryL
ife
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Board Design Prototype

• Created in EagleCAD
• Jumpers make it easy to connect peripherals

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Custom PCB

• Using a flatbed plotter we make our own single
  sided PCBs for testing purposes. We can create
  15 PCBs for less than 25.

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Gateway / iPhone Interface

• Software applications
• iPhone Application
• Gateway Application

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Software Communication
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Software

• iPhone Application
• Primary controlling device
• Touch based interface
• Displays map with location of user and ARMORD

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Software

• iPhone Application
• Written in Objective C
• Apples object oriented version of C
• Runs all C code natively
• Xcode IDE and Interface Builder
• Provides drag and drop UI design

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Software iPhone GUI
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Software iPhone GUI
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Software iPhone GUI
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Software iPhone
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Software iPhone

• Distance Calculation
• Uses latitude and longitude
• Distance in miles
• 3963.0 arccossin(lat1)   sin(lat2)
• cos(lat1) cos(lat2) cos(lon2 - lon1)

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Software Gateway Application

• Purpose
• Wireless bridge between the iPhone and the ARMORD
• Necessary because iPhone cannot easily connect to
  the XBee module
• Communication
• Wi-Fi iPhone
• XBee Robot

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Software Gateway Application

• Requirements
• Wi-Fi connection
• COM port access
• Options
• C
• Java
• Decision Java
• More robust XBee API and support
• Cross platform development

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Software Gateway Application
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Software

• Packet Structure
• From iPhone To ARMORD
• From ARMORD To iPhone

LEFT_MOTOR , RIGHT_MOTOR
LATITUDE , LONGITUDE , MOTOR_BAT , MCU_BAT
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Video Transmission Original Design

• Video is received by video capture card
• Computer broadcasts live stream over Wi-Fi
• iPhone plays live stream

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Video Transmission Original Design

• Problems
• For live video, iPhone only plays H264 video,
  with AAC audio, encapsulated in an MPEG2-TS
• Capture card software could not output proper
  video format
• 10 second video lag from camera to a computer
  watching the stream

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Video Transmission New Design

• Solution External LCD Display
• Allows direct video feed from camera to display
• No processing on a computer to reduce video delay
• iPhone can now display more information on the
  screen
• Maps
• GPS locations
• Distance
• Battery Life

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Controller

• Components
• 7 Standalone Monitor
• Ruggedized Grip and Frame
• AV Receiver
• 9.6V NiMH Battery
• Video and Control up to 100 feet
• Components attached to controller via aluminum
  bracket
• Power supplied to AV Receiver and Monitor through
  9.6V NiMH battery
• Swivel mount to account for inversing camera
  orientation

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Administrative Information

• Project Status
• Budget
• Timeline
• Additional Time

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Project Status
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Budget
Part Name Quantity Price Total Cost
12V 2200mAHr NIMH 1 23.90 23.90
24V 4500mAHr NIMH 2 124.80 249.60
Falcom FSA03 GPS 1 59.95 59.95
24V 252 RPM Geared Motor 4 44.90 179.60
IPhone Grip 1 25.50 25.50
Sabertooth 10A Motor Controller 2 79.99 159.98
7 in. LCD 1 79.99 79.99
2.4GHz Mini Wireless Camera 2 42.50 85.00
Truck Bed Liner 2 9.95 19.90
XBee Pro 3 37.95 113.85
XBee USB Explorer 2 24.95 49.90
XBee Breakout Board 1 9.95 9.95
PIC18F4520 3 4.50 13.50
Misc(Body, Copper Clad, Etc.) NA 150.00 150.00
Developmental Tools NA 150.00 150.00
Shipping/Handling NA 150.00 150.00
Total 25 1,018.83 1520.62
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Timeline
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Additional Time..

• Hardware Add-ons
• Accelerometer to determine speed and orientation
• IR Sensors for Motion Detecting
• Night Vision Camera
• Software Add-ons
• Zero Configuration using Bonjour Protocol
• UDP Broadcast instead of TCP Connection
• Eliminate Gateway

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Questions

• ???