Preliminary Design Review (PDR)

Team Amaze Me

Team Amaze Me

• EE 296 Project (MicroMouse)

• Members– Brandon Gibu– Ah Ram Kim– John-Kalani Miyajima– Justin Ogata

• Website– http://www2.hawaii.edu/~bgibu

Brief Overview of Project

• Micromouse– Autonomous robot– Find center of a 16 x 16 maze– Uses sensors to turn at corners– Uses tracking program to keep track of location

in maze– Continues to search until it finds the fastest

path to center

Brief Overview (continued)

• Approaches– Use tutorials to help construct hardware to

build mouse– Create wall hugger program to randomly

maneuver through maze– Create tracking software to find fastest route to

center

Block Diagram of the Mouse

Mouse Itself

Coding Circuit Hardware (Chassis)

Wall HuggerCode

Circuit Parts(battery supply,

ProtoboardsStepper motor)

Non-Circuit Parts(frame, wheels

Joints)Sensors Rabbit

Stepper MotorCodeTracking Code

*Sub-components are inter-related with each other in some way*

The Chassis of the Mouse in detail

• Base frame (bottom plate)

• The Third Wheel

• Position of the protoboards, sensors, and other circuit elements

• Miscellaneous

Base Frame

• Oval design

• Fold up motor mounts

• Keep the wheels closer together

• Small body frame

The Third Wheel

• It is used to balance the overall weight of the mouse

• Experimented with roller caster• Problem: Possibility of dragging the mouse• Looking for a new 3rd

• wheel

The Position of Circuit Elements

• Stack the protoboards on top of each other• Stack in a easy access manner• Team decided to use a top down layout b/c

of experiment– The infrared sensors (QRD1114) are “weak”– A signal roughly occurs within half an inch

distanc, based on tests

• Battery packs placed in vertical fashion near stepper motor

Miscellaneous

• Try to make it look like a mouse– Either a circuit board in the shape of a mouse

or have a figure of a mouse on top

• Have adjustable arms that connect to areas of the sensors– No two mazes are exactly the same

• Find ways to protect the sensors– Ex. With a side sensor layout, use stand offs

as bumpers to prevent damage

Prototype of Mouse

Front View Side View

Top View Top View

Future Tasks

• Become highly familiar with the behavior of the sensors and “rabbit”

• At the same time, continue making changes on the chassis of the mouse

• Create the Algorithm

• Coding, coding, coding

Potential Problems

• Balance of mouse (extra wheels ???)

• Connecting the right ports to desired input or output

• Supplying enough power to mouse

• Keeping mouse within rules of competition

• Brains of the mouse

• Time constrains

Other Module Analysis-The Circuit(Stepper Motor Problem)

• Voltage drop across stepper motor circuit– Axle rotated only in one direction and stopped

when sensor sensed movement– Voltage supply showed voltage dropping by

half

• LED probe on sensor circuit– Not enough resistance resulting in LED being

very bright and decrease in voltage

Decisions to be Made

• Third wheel(s): low friction pad or canster ball

• Number of sensors to be used

• Exact locations of sensors

• Design mouse into a “mouse”

• Amount of batteries we need to supply mouse

Schedule and Time LineGantt Chart

Thank You

Questions or comments?