RFID based Vehicle Identification & AutoCar Parking System

Submitted By
Sana Amir
10-TE-135
Faiza Mir
10-TE-141
Supervisor
Dr. Adeel Akram
Dean & Chairman of TED

DEPARTMENT OF TELECOM ENGINEERING

FACULTY OF TELECOMMUNICATION AND INFORMATION
ENGINEERING

UNIVERSITY OF ENGINEERING AND TECHNOLOGY

TAXILA
January 2014

Abstract
RFID based Vehicle Identification & Auto-Car Parking System
Sana Amir
10-TE-135
Faiza Mir
10-TE-141
Project Supervisor:

Dr. Adeel Akram

Dean & Chairman of TED
adeel.akram@uettaxila.edu.pk

The Radio frequency identification (RFID) technology promises to be the comprehensive

approach to data collection. Small transponders or tags are attached to a physical object,
which when interrogated wirelessly responds with some identifying information. RFID
has wide ranging applications including Contactless payments, Inventory control, and
Animal identification and Access control systems.
A system of RFID reader and automated car barrier is proposed using Wi-Fi as
communication standard; the reader transmits the tag data wirelessly to a Server for
authentication as per Client-Server Model. The server after matching the tags Unique
Identification (UID) Number with the Database sends authentication information back to
the reader, which can be used for Access control mechanism in the automated car park.

UNDERTAKING
I certify that project titled RFID based Vehicle Identification & Auto-Car Parking
System is my own work. Where material has been used from other sources it has been
properly acknowledged / referred.

Sana Amir
10-TE-135

Faiza Mir
10-TE-141

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
All praise belongs to God to whom all blessings flow and to Our Beloved Prophet
Muhammad (SAW) who is The Benefactor of whole Universe.
We would like to thank our parents for all their Love and support.
We would like to express our sincere gratitude to our supervisor, Prof. Dr. Adeel Akram,
for his guidance, and encouragement.

Contents
Abstract................................................................................................................................i
UNDERTAKING.................................................................................................................ii
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS.................................................................................................iii
List of figures.......................................................................................................................v
List of tables.......................................................................................................................vi
1.

Introduction.................................................................................................................1
1.1.

Radio Frequency Identification.............................................................................1

1.2.

IEEE 802.11b Standard.........................................................................................2

1.3.

PIC Microcontroller..............................................................................................3

1.3.1.

Rotating Motor...............................................................................................3

1.3.2.

Infra-Red........................................................................................................4

1.4.
2.

3.

Objectives..............................................................................................................4

Literature Review........................................................................................................5
2.1.

Passive HF RFID Systems....................................................................................5

2.2.

Wi-Fi Enabled RFID.............................................................................................6

Methodology................................................................................................................8
3.1.

Introduction...........................................................................................................8

3.2.

Block diagram of the proposed design................................................................11

3.3.

Process Flow of the proposed design..................................................................12

3.4.

Gantt chart...........................................................................................................13

3.5.

Next milestones to be achieved...........................................................................14

REFERENCES...................................................................................................................15

List of figures

Number

Page

Fig. 3.1: Block Diagram of Proposed RFID Reader Network9

Fig. 3.2: Visio Diagram of Proposed design..11
Fig. 3.3: Flow chart of proposed design.12
Fig. 3.4: Gantt chart of Proposed design...13

List of tables
Table 1.1: IEEE 802.11 Standards..3
Table 3.1: Timeline of expected design13

1. Introduction
1.1.

Radio Frequency Identification

Radio-frequency identification (RFID) is an automatic identification method wherein the

data stored on RFID tags or transponders is remotely retrieved. The RFID tag is a device
that can be attached to or incorporated into a product, animal or person for identification
and tracking using radio waves. Some tags can be read from several meters away, beyond
the line of sight of the reader.
Basically, an RFID system consists of an antenna or coil, a transceiver (with decoder) and
a transponder (RF tag) electronically programmed with unique information. There are
many different types of RFID systems in the market. These are categorized on the basis
of their frequency ranges. Some of the most commonly used RFID kits are low-frequency
(30-500kHz), mid-frequency (900kHz-1500MHz) and high-frequency (2.4-2.5GHz).
Auto-ID systems attach an identifier to a physical object that can be read automatically.
This identifier can be represented optically, electromagnetically or even chemically.
RFID based Auto-ID systems dont have performance limitations as found in other auto
identification systems such as optical bar codes. There is no requirement of Line of sight
or Human intervention for data to be read.
Some of the applications of RFID include Contactless payment, Inventory control,
Livestock tracking, Electronic toll system, stored value systems, supply chain
1

management and Access control. We are interested in the RFID proximity cards that are
commonly used for building access control at many companies and universities across the
world.

1.2.

IEEE 802.11b Standard

IEEE 802.11 is an international standard for Wireless Local Area Networks (WLANs).
The name Wi-Fi (short for Wireless Fidelity) corresponds to the certification given by
Wi-Fi Alliance, a group that ensures compatibility between hardware devices that use
802.11 standard. A Wi-Fi network is actually a network that complies with IEEE 802.11
standard.
IEEE 802.11 standard specifies the two low level layers of the OSI model, namely: the
physical layer and data link layer. The physical layer defines the radio wave modulation
and signaling characteristics for data transmission. The data link layer is further
composed of Logical link Layer and Medium Access Control Layer. The physical layer
has three standards: FHSS, DSSS and Infrared. 802.11 standard has different variants
designated by alphabets a, b, g, n etc. depending upon the physical layer standard and
MAC they use.

Data Link Layer

802.2

(MAC)

802.11

Physical Layer
DSSS FHSS Infrared
(PHY)
Table 1.1: IEEE 802.11 Standards

1.3.

PIC Microcontroller

PIC is a family of modified Harvard architecture microcontrollers made by Microchip

Technology, derived from the PIC1650 originally developed by General Instrument's
Microelectronics Division. The name PIC initially referred to "Peripheral Interface
Controller
PICs are popular with both industrial developers and hobbyists alike due to their low
cost, wide availability, large user base, extensive collection of application notes,
availability of low cost or free development tools, and serial programming (and reprogramming with flash memory) capability.
1.3.1. Rotating Motor
Rotating motor works on the principle of gears. A rotating motor is used to move the
barrier up and down.
1.3.2. Infra-Red
An electronic sensor that measures infrared (IR) light radiating from objects in its field of
view. They are most often used in motion detectors. All objects with a temperature above
absolute zero emit heat energy in the form of radiation. Usually this radiation is invisible
3

to the human eye because it radiates at infrared wavelengths, but it can be detected by
electronic devices designed for such a purpose. We are using this technology for safety
purposes. The IR sensor indicates the status of the vehicle that it has safely crossed the
barrier premises.

1.4.

Objectives

The objectives of this project are:

To Design and implement a prototype RFID auto-car parking using Wi-Fi as

communication standard
To manage entry and exit for capacity estimation and reducing parking issues
To facilitate the employees of our department by automating the parking lot of

TED
To reduce cost of future RFID deployments at UET, Taxila

2. Literature Review
2.1.

Passive HF RFID Systems

HF RFID is one of the most popular RFID technologies, it operates at 13.56MHz.

Common applications of HF-RFID are access control, POS Systems, contactless
payments, bank and identity cards and product authentication all of which have specific
implementation requirements like Read distance. These standard interference avoidance
criteria and physical constraints have limited the maximum read distance of all HF-RFID
at about 1.5 m. HF RFID systems are commonly implemented as passive devices that use
Inductive magnetic coupling to set-up a two way communication between a reader and a
tag and found in also to provide battery-less with power. Both the reader and the tag use a
coil as an antenna. Reader transmits a query to the tag by amplitude modulated (AM)
magnetic field, the tag modulates the load seen by the tag at its coil of the transformer to
pass an answer back to the reader. More detailed information about the working of HF
RFID systems can be found in Finkenzeller [1].
Most contactless smart card /proximity cards applications are based on ISO/IEC 14443
Standard, which defines proximity cards used for identification and authentication and
the transmission protocols for communicating with it. It consists of four parts:

ISO/IEC 14443Part 1: Physical characteristics [2]

ISO/IEC 14443 Part 2: Radio frequency power and signal interfaces [3]

ISO/IEC 1444 Part 3: Initialization and anti-collision [4]

ISO/IEC 14443 Part 4: Transmission protocol [5]

Two types of cards are defined: Type A & B both communicate with the reader at
13.56MHz, have same transmission protocol but different modulation method, coding
schemes etc. ISO/IEC 14443 standard uses the term Proximity coupling device (PCD) for
RFID reader and Proximity integrated circuit card (PICC) for the tag.

2.2.

Wi-Fi Enabled RFID

RFID systems are low bit rate wireless networks designed to exchange a very small
amount of data over a very short distance using tags and readers based on standard
interface protocol. RFID networks have begun to converge with short range wireless data
networks like Bluetooth, Zigbee, Wi-Fi and NFC, with RF part of RFID being expanded
to include these short range wireless technologies. It can be said that RFID applications
are going to piggy back on these Wireless personal area networks (WPANs) and
Wireless local area networks (WLANs) using active tags that communicate with these
technologies air interface protocol.[6] Active RFID has been integrated with the Wi-Fi in
the so called Wi-Fi enabled RFID. Wi-Fi enabled RFID is commonly used for location
based services (LBS) in which a physical object is tracked in a specific physical context.
The Active tags communicate with the Wi-Fi air interface protocol, in our design quite
the opposite has been proposed: the tags communicate with the reader with ISO/IEC
6

14443 air interface protocol at 13.56MHz however to take advantage of range of Wi-Fi,
the reader communicates with Wi-Fi networks air interface to transmit the data to the
central location through IP routing and Addressing.
A regular RFID system can only give Choke point location which means the tag
location is known in relation to the location of reader. On the contrary, Wi-Fi network can
give the precise coordinates of a tag using its own positioning algorithm similar to GPS.
In such RFID systems, Wi-Fi devices act as tags and Wi-Fi Access points as Readers. The
MAC address on the tag serves as a unique identifier and the specific coordinates are
determined by location software. Kidspotter is one such example that has used Wi-Fi
enabled tags to track children in a theme park. [7] AeroScout [8] and Cisco [9] have
published detailed reports on the utilization of Wi-Fi wireless networks for Active RFID.

3. Methodology
Proposed RFID Auto-car Parking System Architecture
3.1. Introduction
The main purpose of creating an RFID auto-car parking system is to facilitate the
employees of TED by providing them with the automated car-parking facility that is
reserved just for them. The goal of this project is to use Wi-Fi communication standard to
enable RFID readers to communicate wirelessly in a network. The RFID Readers will
send the tag data to the Server for authentication and received authentication information
is used for Access control for barrier opening mechanism and LEDs to indicate a valid
user.
The entire system is modeled as per the Block Diagram shown in Fig. 3.1. All the
hardware is divided in two parts, namely Client and Server, running the application
software which is developed as per client-server communication algorithms. The Work
assignment of the Client is to initiate communication with Server and establish link for
data transfer through TCP/IP protocol over the Wi-Fi Network, reading the UID of RFID
tags, sending the acquired tag information to the server for authentication, and generate
control signals to operate Access Control for barrier opening mechanism based upon
authentication information received from server. The function of the server is to listen to
the request of link connection from the client, to allow them to send tag data, to receive
8

and dispatch tag data to the database server for authentication, to match the UID of tags
with the that of Registered users in the database, send the authentication information back
to the requesting client for the access control mechanism and to enter the information
(date, check in time, Name) of registered users in the database against their UID to have a
log of entries.

Barrier

Fig. 3.1: Block Diagram of Proposed RFID Reader Network

The Client consists of an RFID reader module designed for ISO/IEC-14443A Standard,
along with a Microcontroller and Wi-Fi Network Module. Both the RFID Reader and WiFi Network Module are interfaced with the Microcontroller. RFID Reader reads the tags
in the vicinity and sends the UID of the tag to the Microcontroller over serial, which
9

sends the UID of the tag along with the Device ID to the Wi-Fi Network Module to be
sent to the Server through TCP/IP link over Wi-Fi network for authentication. The server
replies with the requested authentication information, if UID of the tag matches that of
any registered users, the server sends the information about tag being authentic and vice
versa. The application program developed at server sends the authentication information
back to the client. The microcontroller is programmed to receive the authentication
information and implement access control. If the tag is authentic microcontroller makes
the GREEN LED glow and the barrier to open, otherwise if the tag is invalid the RED
LED glows and barrier remains down.
The Server is simply a Windows operating System based PC running the application
program with all the features required. The application running on the server is a
multithreaded parallel executable application developed in C# .NET framework. The
main work of Server is to receive the Tag data from the client over Network through
TCP/IP Server Application, to provide this information to the Database server for the
authentication of tags and data logging in case the tag is authentic, the server also sends
back authentication information to the requesting Client for access control mechanism.
The application has been developed in C# using socket programming; all the clients send
the tag information to the Server Using IP Address and Port Number defined for socket

3.2.

Block diagram of the proposed design

10

Fig. 3.2: Visio Diagram of Proposed design

3.3.

Process Flow of the proposed design

11

Fig. 3.3: Flow chart of proposed design

3.4.

Gantt chart
12

Task Name

Duration

Start

Finish

literature Review

3 wks

Tue 1/10/13

Mon 21/10/13

selecting soft and hard

2 wks

Tue 22/10/13

Mon 4/11/13

tool learning with examples

5 wks

Tue 5/11/13

Mon 9/12/13

designing circuitry(PsPice)

2 wks

Tue 22/10/13

Mon 4/11/13

buying equipment

2 wks

Tue 5/11/13

Mon 18/11/13

making server & C.S.

5 wks

Tue 10/12/13

Mon 13/1/14

integrating the relay

5 wks

Tue 14/1/14

Mon 17/2/14

implementing prototype

5 wks

Tue 18/2/14

Mon 24/3/14

creating RTS

10 wks

Tue 25/3/14

Mon 2/6/14

Table 3.1: Timeline of expected design

Fig. 3.4: Gantt chart of Proposed design

3.5.

Next milestones to be achieved

Interfacing the RFID reader with WIFI module

Interfacing the reader with relay
Integrating with the server data base
Taking precautions for vehicle safety
13

Designing the prototype of the project

Making a Real-time system of it.

14

REFERENCES
[1] K. Finkenzeller, RFID Handbook, 2nd Edition New York: Wiley, 2003.
[2] Identification Cards--Contactless Integrated Cards--Proximity Cards-Part1: Physical
Characteristics, Int. Std. ISO/IEC 14443-1, ISO/IEC/JTC1 Inf. Technol., 1997,
ISO/IEC/JTC1.
[3] Identification Cards--Contactless Integrated Cards--Proximity Cards-Part2: Radio
Frequency Power and Signal Interface, Int. Std. ISO/IEC 14443-2, ISO/IEC/JTC1 Inf.
Technol., 1997, ISO/IEC/JTC1.
[4]

Identification

Cards--Contactless

Integrated

Cards--Proximity

Cards-Part3:

Initialization and Anti-collision, Int. Std. ISO/IEC 14443-3, ISO/IEC/JTC1 Inf. Technol.,
1997, ISO/IEC/JTC1.
[5]

Identification

Cards--Contactless

Integrated

Cards--Proximity

Cards-Part1:

Transmission Protocol, Int. Std. ISO/IEC 14443-1, ISO/IEC/JTC1 Inf. Technol., 1997,
ISO/IEC/JTC1.
[6]Charlie Fine et al, The Evolution of RFID Networks, MIT Case study retrieved from
www.cfp.mit.edu/docs/rfid-casestudy-march2006.pdf
[7] Jonathan Collins, Lost and Found in legoland, RFID Journal, July 09, 2004

15

[8]AeroScout, Utilizing WiFi Standard Wireless Networks For Active RFID, White
paper retrieved from www.mas-rfid-solutions.com/Utilizing%20WiFi%20.pdf
[9] Cisco, How Cisco tracks RFID with Active RFID and Wireless LANs, Cisco IT Case
study, Cisco India2

16