Author: mtita

These past two weeks have been working on getting the robot to pick up a box every time. We integrated the qr algo with the robot kinematic algorithm and were able to reliably pick up multiple boxes in a row.

We are going to continue to work to make the process more reliable and integrate with bins for sorting.

The last two weeks Ive been testing and rebuilding the robot arm to make it more reliable. I have updated system to have both arm and electronic controllers on the same 3d printed structure, and revised pieces to make wires internal. I tested some pwm ramping functions, and am still revising control software.

I had difficulty threading the wires through the structural components, and adjusting calibration for each new iteration.

Next week we are going to work on dialing in arm movement.

This week we worked to integrate all of our components. We were able to integrate the camera with the robot arm and ewer able to track qr codes and use that as a trigger to pick up packadges. We connect the camera to the Arduino through the macbook serial. We are going to work on making the movements faster and qr codes more accurate.

This week I wrote more code to control the robot arm, and designed a clamp to connect the camera to our treadmill in a robust non moving manner. I isolated the vacuum from the sensors to help with keeping steady voltage feedback. We were able to get the robot to pick up multiple packages in a row. Next steps are adding better move selection and qr tracking.

This week we put it all together and got our robot to pick up packages off a moving conveyer belt. This was accomplished by wiring up the robot fully, and using the Arduino to run multiple to-position moves. This serves as a big milestone for us as we have achieved a working robot that can complete tasks.

Our next steps are fine tuning our control algos over the coming weeks to pick up lots of packages fast. We need to dial in our time tolerances. We also need to add boxes for the robot to put boxes into.

 

This week I finished up wiring the robot and wrote code to run and send angle feedback position moves. It took alot of trouble shooting to get all three angle sensors accurately measuring 0-180 of the three main actuators but luckily it wasn’t to hard to get the vacuum to turn on and off.  I spent alot of time this week wiring, troubleshooting, and programming the robot arm. Luckily all the work paid off and we had a successful package pick up and move. I was able to get the robot to run to 7 diffrent positions in a row using a command sender app and a Arduino control sketch. I got the robot to pick up a moving package on its 15th try.

Our next steps are combining our QR and robot algos, then we should be able to sort package efficiently

This week we worked on out qr tracking algorithm for realtime tracking down the conveyor belt. We also wired the robot arm and got it to pick up packages. Our next steps are finishing the robot arm and getting it to pick up packages off of the conveyor belt.

This week I soldered most of the arm wiring, and connected it up to an Arduino controller. I testes the voltage feedback for each component. The 360 angle sensors were more like 180 so I had to account for dead space in the actuator movement. It took many iterations of Arduino to get the angles dialed to have each actuator have an accurate 0 – 180 measurement. I then wired the motors for t1 an t2. I had to get the direction of rotation and limit switches right  through flipping wires. I was able to get t1 and t2 to run specific angle moves with feedback. I then wired the vacuum and got the robot to do a box pick up move.

Next steps are: getting the robot to run multiple sequential moves instead of just 1, and wiring the rest of the robot motors and servo, t0 and the t4 servo. I working to figure out how to post videos on this website.

 

This week we worked on the design report and planning out the connection of our algorithms. We discussed using pixel differences in the qr to judge the height of the box on the treadmill. We are working to test the camera and the rest of our electrical components. When we get the robot arm to work were are going to feed it live position control calculate from camera data.

Here is about halfway finished soldering and wiring of the robot arm motor control box. 

 

These weeks I worked on the report and wiring the robot. I was able to wire about half of the robot and do tests on one of motors and angle sensors. I was able to create a preliminary Arduino angle feedback control system for 1 motor. One setback is that the “360” angle sensors were actually 250, and I think the overall cause was esp32 only supporting 3.3v and not 5. This problem might require a switch to arduino. Otherwise everything going smooth, next week I am going to finish wiring the robot arm and do full movement tests.