Line Following Robot

This line following robot is a robot that follows a black against a white/light background. It follows the line just like a track and stops at the ending strip.

Engineer

Ashwini A

Area of Interest

Computer Science

School

Leland High School

Grade

Incoming Sophomore

Bill of Materials

Build Plan

Here’s a link to my Buildplan: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1v__661z4bECuCAjWEi7vR4O_k_wdyThlJZMKbSTiFH8/edit

Here’s a link to my Bill of Materials: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1j5XaEAGfn3GBis5GBj1GQgLYpG7RuY8ffPuvNLtsiss/edit#gid=0

Simon Says Game Starter Project

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Hi, my name is Ashwini and I am a rising sophomore at Leland High School. The starter project I chose was the simon says game. I chose this project because I remember playing this game a lot when I was younger, so I thought it would be cool to make a project based on it. How it works is that once you turn it on by pressing a button, it will flash a light using the led’s. If you press the button corresponding to the led correctly, the lights will flash another pattern with one more led, and it keeps going and adding lights until you get ten rounds correct, where the buzzer gives out a winning tone. If you get the pattern wrong the buzzer will give a losing tone and you will have to start over. The function of the potentiometer is to adjust the volume of the buzzer. Some of the jumper wires connect the led’s to pins on the arduino, and other jumper wires connect the push buttons to the pins on the arduino. The buzzer also has a jumper wire to a pin on the arduino. The code then corresponds the pins to the pushbuttons and led’s, and the buzzer and produces different functions.The main struggle I had was the game wasn’t working how it was supposed to after I finished assembling everything. At first I thought that some of the jumper wires were misplaced, but after triple checking I realized that it was a problem with the buttons. It turns out that the buttons weren’t fully pushed in the breadboard. Things I learnt was how the breadboard works, and some functions of the arduino code. I thought this was a really good start to engineering and for understanding arduino, and I enjoyed the final output of the starter project. Next, Ill be working on my main project which is the line following robot.

Here’s a link to the Simon says game instructions and code: https://learn.sparkfun.com/tutorials/sparkfun-inventors-kit-experiment-guide—v40/circuit-2c-simon-says-game-

First Milestone

L298 Motor Driver

My first milestone was getting the motors to work with the arduino. I first had to solder the red and black wires to each of the motors. Then I tested each of the motors by using only the motor driver. The battery pack was connected to ground and 5v on the motor driver. I connected the motor drivers to pins on the side. I then connected a wire to 12v and I touched the pins in1 to in4 to see if the motors work. Once they worked, I connected Ena/b and in1-4 to pins on my arduino, as well as ground and five volts. Then I uploaded the arduino code to run tests and it worked. The main struggle I had was making sure the solder did not touch the plastic part of the motor, but luckily I didn’t have to de sauter anything. Things I learnt was that using the motor driver with arduino would allow me to change the speed and direction of the motors. The Ena/b and in1-4 pins are the motor control pins, and the pins on the side are for controlling the motors. My next milestone will be to get the ir sensors to work with the arduino. Thank You.

Wiring Motor Driver to Arduino

Arduino Code

Here’s a link to my Github: https://github.com/ashwiniarun/Line-Following-Robot/blob/master/ir_sensors.ino

Second Milestone

IR Proximity Sensor

My second milestone was getting the ir proximity sensors to work with the arduino, and assemble the robot. How this works is that the robot senses the black line in the white background and follows it like it’s a track and finally stops when it senses only black. First, I connected the sensors to a breadboard because I had to power two sensors and then I connected it to the arduino. I uploaded a simple code to test if the sensors work by using the serial monitor. The sensors only senses black and white so when I hover the sensors over black it showed 1023, and over white, it showed 23. After I uploaded the code to make the mtor driver work with the sensors, I assembled the wheels, motors, and essentially the whole robot. One of the main struggles I had was that the 5 volt power on the arduino needed to be connected to both the ir sensors and the motor driver. What I did to fix this problem was that I soldered two core wires to one wire and covered it with a heat shrink. This way, one wire could be on the breadboard, and the other could power the motor driver. Some of the things I learned was how the ir sensors work and how to change my code to control my ir sensors and the motor.

Wiring for IR Proximity Sensors

Final Reflection / Demo Night

My experience at Bluestamp was really memorable and eventful. I learnt a lot of things I never thought I could learn in two weeks! This includes information about my Arduino/code, the ir proximity sensors, motor drivers, and hardware components regarding my project. I also learnt important skills like soldering, and splitting wire. I will never forget this exciting experience and it really made a difference in my interest in engineering!