Final images

Detail photos

Final project movies

Narrative description

A small metal knob is twisted to move a popsicle stick wall forward. When the popsicle stick wall moves forward, a distance sensor (the sensor that looks like goggles), measures the distance between it and the wall. This measurement is sent to the lightbulb, where it changes how bright it is depending on the measurement. 

Progress images

Discussion

Ultimately, the thing that was most difficult about the process was working out what went wrong. In theory and concept, everything makes sense until hardware is applied. Then finding good debugging methods is difficult. 

For example, getting the initial concept drawings and the supposed application of our sensors was pretty easy. Especially since we chose to use parts that we had worked with before in the tutorials. However, once the actual application started, such as combining the units of working code, as well as bouncing between understanding if the code or hardware didn't work, that was where the majority of the time was spent. Since neither of us was very familiar with Arduino code, both of us had to really switch back and forth between checking the code versus checking the wiring. In Wendy's case, she spent a lot of time assembling the wiring and understanding how to get all the circuitry to work. Luke ended up using Wendy's design to complete the project, and still found difficulty in putting the completed design together, despite having working hardware to reference.  For example, Luke spent an hour trying to understand why the skip button did not work, by editing the circuits and checking grounds, only to realize the button itself did not work.

In retrospect, we were both glad that we had a project that was based on the tutorials of the work we did, and wouldn't really change too much. However, through this project, we really gained an understanding of the time required to get simple ideas to work well, and how the development and debugging of projects is very time-consuming.

Functional block diagram and electrical schematic

Code

//Double Transducer Project 1:

//Wendy Lin and Luke Shen

//The code takes in a potentiometer value and sends it to the motor

//it also takes the value of the ultrasonic sensor and sends it to the 

//bulb. If the trigger is pushed, it sends the poteniometer value to the

//bulb instead.

/*

  Pin mapping:

  Arduino pin | role  |  description

  -------------------------------------

  A0            input    Potentiometer

  2             output   Servo Motor

  8             input    Button skip-the-middle

  6             output   Bulb

  12                     Ultrasonic Ranger Trigger

  11                     Ultrasonic Ranger Echo

*/

#include <Wire.h>

#include <LiquidCrystal_I2C.h>

#include <NewPing.h>

#include <Servo.h>

#define ECHO_PIN     11

#define MAX_DISTANCE 200

//Setting the Pin numbers

const int POTPIN = A0;

const int GAUGEMOTORPIN = 2;

const int BUTTONPIN = 8;

const int BULBPIN = 6;

const int TRIGGER_PIN = 12;

//Motor

Servo gaugeMotor;

NewPing sonar(TRIGGER_PIN, ECHO_PIN, MAX_DISTANCE);

//LCD Screen

LiquidCrystal_I2C screen(0x27, 16, 2);

///////////////

void setup() {

 //Reading Pins

 pinMode(POTPIN, INPUT);

 pinMode(GAUGEMOTORPIN, OUTPUT);

 pinMode(BUTTONPIN, OUTPUT);

 pinMode(BULBPIN, OUTPUT);

 //Gauge Motor read

 gaugeMotor.attach(GAUGEMOTORPIN);

 Serial.begin(9600);  

 gaugeMotor.write(0);

 delay(1000);

 //Screen

 screen.init();

 screen.backlight();

 screen.home();

 screen.print("Hello, world!");

 screen.setCursor(0, 1);

}

void loop() {

 // bulb brightness

 int brightness = 0;

 //readimg values

 int potVal = analogRead(POTPIN);

 int buttonVal = digitalRead(BUTTONPIN);

  //potentiometer read and map to motor

 int potDispVal = map(potVal, 0, 1023, 0, 99);

 int motorVal = map(potVal, 0, 1023, 0, 47);

 int motorDispVal = map(motorVal, 0, 47, 0, 99);

 //reading distance and map to display

 int distance = (sonar.ping_cm());

 int distDispVal = map(distance, 2, 9, 0, 99);

 if (buttonVal == HIGH) {

   //if button pressed, map potentiometer to brightness

   Serial.println(5);

   brightness = map(potVal, 0, 1023, 0, 255);

   analogWrite(BULBPIN, brightness);

   delay(10);

 } else {

   //if button not pressed, move motor and use distance from ultrasonic ranger

   gaugeMotor.write(motorVal);

   delay(10);

   // mapping distance to brightness

   Serial.println(0);

   brightness = map(distance, 2, 9, 0, 255);

   analogWrite(BULBPIN, brightness);

   delay(10);

 }

 //display brightness

 int brightDisp = map(brightness, 0, 255, 0, 99);

  // LCD Display

 screen.clear();

 screen.print("i:");

 screen.print(potDispVal);

 screen.print(" ");

 screen.print("m:");

 screen.print(motorDispVal);

 screen.setCursor(7, 1);

 screen.print(distDispVal);

 screen.setCursor(11, 1);

 screen.print("o:");

 screen.print(brightDisp);

 screen.setCursor(0, 1);

}