apstone Design Project
SPRING 2001Example Mechatronics Projects
(Interested in participating in a mechatronics project?
Apply to the mechatronics option in ME at UW)
Piezoelectric Rotational Motor:
Roozbeh Chavoshian, David Keller, Richard Morris, Alex Nameroff, Timothy Reed
designed and built a piezoelectric rotational motor. Each piezo makes
micron-sized steps -- these steps are accumulated
to achieve large-scale movement. This project was part of ME 495 (Mechatronics) Capstone Design Project
SPRING 2001
Video of piezomotor in operation
Autonomous Submarine Project: Jason
Ginn, Adam Robinson and Joe Schroeder developed automatic depth and pitch
control to aid Future Human Powered Submarine Teams to achieve and maintain a
desired depth --
it is challenging to maintain a
constant depth with the human powered submarine. The depth tends to oscillate
due to possible driver over-
correction
and thus degrades performance. Issues included the modeling of the nonlinear submarine
dynamics and the choice of adequate number (and type) of sensors and actuators.
The team designed and built a prototype submarine and successfully demonstrated the
effectiveness of their controller using an HC11 microcontroller.
This project was part of ME495 (Mechatronics) Capstone Design Projects,
SPRING 2005
Video of Initial Test
Video of Depth Control
Shape Memory Alloy (SMA)
Actuated Robotic Arm:
Moses Chong, Binh
Huynh, Patrick McConnell, James McDonnell, Levi Mulkey, Piandy Piandy, and
Matthew Spencer designed a shape-memory-alloy (SMA) rotary actuator for a
robo
tic arm. Additionally, an SMA actuated hand was designed to grasp objects
such as a can (shown in
the video). Challenges included the modeling of the
nonlinear hysteretic behavior of the SMA and the design of a controller for the
nonlinear system. The actuator was used to control the position of a
robotic arm to simulate human motion – with 90 degrees of rotation and 0.1 Hz.
A prototype was designed and successfully tested. This project was part of ME495 (Mechatronics) Capstone Design Projects,
SPRING 2005
Shape
Memory Alloy (SMA)
Actuated Insect-like
Robot: Reese Allen, Ryan Goding,
and Mohd Ikmal Ismail
built and tested a shape memory alloy (SMA)
based bio-mimetic robot. This insect-like robot had six legs; each leg
motion was controlled with SMA wires. The finished robot fitted within
a size restriction of 6” X 6” X 6”.
This project was part of ME 495 (Mechatronics) Capstone Design Projects,
SPRING 2007
Piezoelectric Robot: Robert David Oylear and Amar
Seta built and tested a
piezoelectric bio-mimetic robot. This insect-like robot had six legs;
each leg motion was generated using bimorph piezoelectric
actuators, which were driven by asymmetric input waves. The finished
robot fit
ted
within a size restriction of 6” X 6” X 6”. Although, each actuator’s mo
tion
was only in the micron range, the robot successfully achieved a speed
of
1.8 cm/s. This
project was part of ME 495 (Mechatronics) Capstone Design Projects, SPRING 2007
SMA Actuated Robotic Fingers:
Alexan
der
Lee and Ian
Cairns built
and tested SMA-based bio-mimetic fingers. This was the summer project of these
high school to-be-seniors in 2007. They based the design on human muscles; a
battery was used supply power to actuate (heat) the SMA wires to bend the fingers
and a spring was used to extend these fingers back.
Video
of Preliminary Test
Video of Final
Presentation
Power Point Presentation
Brain Controlled Interface for Robotics
Mark Kirshenbaum,
Dori
an
Gahm and Sean Chang designed a sensor to measure forehead
muscle motions to control robotic devices.
Challenges including
conditioning of the signals measured from a headband, and signal
processing to control a motor. The signals were
used to control This project was part of ME495 (Mechatronics)
Capstone Design Projects, SPRING 2009
Robotic End-Effector
Joleen Grazier, Matth
ew
Lai, Geoff Wales, and Alicia
Skilton designed an end effector for a
robotic arm to pick up test tubes and beakers.
Challenges
including
programming the HC12 to control a stepper motor and interfacing the design with
a FANUC robotic arm. This project was part of ME495 (Mechatronics)
Capstone Design Projects, SPRING 2009
Gutter Bot
Taylor Grenier, Martin Vogel, Zack
S
mith
and Michael Somintac designed and built a prototype gutter cleaning robot.
Challenges
including making a small enough prototype to fit in a standard gutter, sensing
if the robot is stuck or if it has reached the end of a gutter, and designing an
anti-flip mechanism. This project was part of ME495 (Mechatronics)
Capstone Design Projects, SPRING 2009
Quad-copter
T J Werle, Brandon O'Toole, Scott Wilcox,
and Robbie Schwartz built a prototy
pe
4-rotor helicopter.
Challenges including designing a light-weight frame and controlling the motors
using pulse-width modulation with the HC12. This project was part of ME495 (Mechatronics)
Capstone Design Projects, SPRING 2009
Solar Panel Tracker
Haris Ozegovich, Azamat Akkushin,
Alexander
Babchanik, and Michael Karatsupa designed a solar tracker to keep solar
panels aligned to the sun.
Challenges
included
handling interference such as a cloud layer and variations in intensity.
A. prototype was designed and successfully tested to show the ability to
track a potentially varying light
source. This project was part of ME495 (Mechatronics)
Capstone Design Projects, SPRING 2009
BIO-MIMETIC SWIMMER
Alex
Ching, a Sophomore majoring in Mechanical and Electrical Engineering with a
focus in robotics, investigated the use of fluid waves to actuate a
bio-mimetic swimmer as part of his summer research project in 2010.
Path Following Robot
Felix Nurdin, Nick Andrews, Anthony Johnson, and Kevin Hsieh designed this autonomous path following robot. The main challenges were sensor integration and the development of a tracking control law. They successfully implemented the controller using both analog differential sensing and digital absolute sensing. This project was part of ME495 (Mechatronics) Capstone Design Projects, SPRING 2011.
Shape Memory Alloy Electronic Braille
Tim Campbell, Shota Pearce, and Nick Smith designed an electronic braille reader. The main challenge was to reduce the footprint of the actuator to the same size of that of a Braille pin. They successfully designed, implemented and tested a prototype using SMA actuators. This project was part of ME495 (Mechatronics) Capstone Design Projects, SPRING 2011.
Dynamic Flight Control
Steven Chukri, George Hoffman, Grant Boursaw and Benjamin Culver designed a feedback system for flight control. The main challenges wereto manage the large friction in the motors, and substantial noise in the sensors. They successfully designed, implemented and tested a prototype using a pulse-modulated control of the elevators. This project was part of ME495 (Mechatronics) Capstone Design Projects, SPRING 2011.
Solar Tracker
Valerie Chun, Charisse Lewis, Stephan Favilla and Megan Mamiya designed a solar tracker. The main challenge was to reduce the amount of energy needed for the tracking. They used pre-computed trajectories (based on latitude and longitude) to control stepper motors for the tracking. This project was part of ME495 (Mechatronics) Capstone Design Projects, SPRING 2011.
Head-Movement Actuated Robotic Arm
Adrian Haruta, Yong Park and Hyowon Jung designed a human interface to control a robotic arm. The main challenge was to enable intuitive control of the robotic arm. They used a tilt sensor on a cap to provide inputs to the robotic arm. This project was part of ME495 (Mechatronics) Capstone Design Projects, SPRING 2011.
Biomimetic Jellyfish Group
Ryan Warnock, Matthew Burkhardt, Stephen Kreiger and Kara Wilder designed a Jelly Fish. The main challenge was to operate the system in water, with similar beat patterns and dimensions as a Jellyfish. They used an SMA actuator to reduce weight and provide sufficient force to move the system through water. This project was part of ME495 (Mechatronics) Capstone Design Projects, SPRING 2011.
Other projects
Design and Control of Dual Stage Actuators: Students designed, built, and controlled this dual-stage piezo-positioning system. This dual-stage system integrates a relatively large piezo to achieve large range (although the bandwidth and precision is low) with a smaller piezo with high bandwidth and high precision (although with low range). The integrated system achieves precision, large-range positioning with high bandwidth. This project was part of ME495 (Mechatronics) Capstone Design Projects, Spring 2003
Active Vibration Suppression: Students in the Mechatronics thread designed and, built a flexible structure that simulated the vibrations of the Yokohama Landmark Tower (a 70-story, 296-meter building in Yokohama City), which was the tallest building in Japan as of 1998. An Active Mass Damper system was added to the top of the flexible structure and the students built a control system to reduce the structural vibration. This project was part of ME495 (Mechatronics) Capstone Design Projects, Spring 2003
Control of High-Speed Scanners : As part of the Mechatronics project, students built an optical sensor (with nanoscale resolution) for measuring and controlling vibrations in a piezo-scanner during high-speed positioning. The sensor was calibrated with an inductive sensor and a controller was designed, built and tested for vibration suppression. This project was part of ME495 (Mechatronics) Capstone Design Projects, Spring 2003
Boom
Crane Dynamics and Control: As part of the
Mechatronics project, students built a prototype crane, modeled the system,
designed and implemented a controller, and tested its ability to reduce the
settling time. Data acquisition and evaluation were performed with a
microcontroller.
This project was part of ME495 (Mechatronics) Capstone Design Projects, Spring 2005
Maintaining XM Satellite Radio Orientation in Alaska: This project built and tested a prototype system for fishermen in Alaska that orients the XM Satellite radio pointed to the south (even as the boat’s orientation changes) for good reception. The team built and tested an analog control system, which integrated an analog compass sensor to maintain the southward orientation even as the base (that holds the system) changes orientation. This project was part of ME495 (Mechatronics) Capstone Design Projects, Spring 2007
Other projects on mobile robots
Acknowledgement: Projects were partially support by grants from the National Science Foundation.
Interested in participating in a mechatronics project?
Apply to the mechatronics option in ME at UW
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