Android controlled vehicle.

Introduction:

Now days everything is turning smart. With wide advancements in technology, people are slowly

migrating from human tasks to completely automated ones. Day by day the cost of automation is

also coming down and now people can easily afford automated devices. Whether it is the smart

home or smart office, automation has made these things easily accessible to the common man.

Even in the field of automobile engineering it is inevitable to use smart systems. With technology

running at fast pace, it is necessary to go ahead with technology, as it not only makes a human

more smart in this fast running world but also reduces the tasks on human beings.

Taking all these factors into consideration this project involves designing and fabrication of

android controlled vehicle prototype. This vehicle can be operated wirelessly over the Bluetooth

using an android cell phone which can command the vehicle to navigate.

The robotic vehicle also has an intelligent system to automatically reduce the speed of the

vehicle and brake it when some other vehicle comes in front of it thus preventing accidents.
Objective:

The following are the main objectives of the project. These will be accomplishes one by one to

make a fully smart android controlled vehicle prototype.

1) To design and fabricate a vehicle prototype which can be controlled by any android

operated cell phone or tablet.

2) To incorporate the feature of accident prevention. This is done by adding collision

detection and prevention system which automatically brakes the robotic vehicle when

there is another vehicle or an obstacle in front of it.

Research Methodology:
The android operating system is very famous now days in smartphone market. Android is a

mobile operating system (OS) based on the Linux kernel and currently developed by Google.

With a user interface based on direct manipulation, Android is designed primarily for

touchscreen mobile devices such as smartphones and tablet computers, with specialized user

interfaces for televisions (Android TV), cars (Android Auto), and wrist watches (Android Wear).

The OS uses touch inputs that loosely correspond to real-world actions, like swiping, tapping,

pinching, and reverse pinching to manipulate on-screen objects, and a virtual keyboard. Despite

being primarily designed for touchscreen input, it also has been used in game consoles, digital

cameras, regular PCs (e.g. the HP Slate 21) and other electronics.

This project involves harnessing the power of android to drive a vehicle which can be controlled

using an android enabled cell phone. The entire research methodology of the project can be

divided into following modules. As we move ahead with the project, every module will be

completed one by one which will then be assembled to make complete working prototype of

android controlled vehicle.

The entire approach to the project is divided into the following modules:

1) The Mechanical assembly of vehicle.

2) The microcontroller board
3) The Bluetooth and the android interface
4) The Smart accident avoidance system

1) The mechanical assembly of the vehicle:

The mechanical assembly of the vehicle consists of designing and fabricating the

prototype of the vehicle. The frame or chassis of the vehicle is fabricated in the

mechanical assembly of the vehicle. This forms the base on which other components of
 the vehicle will be mounted. The chassis is the integral part of this project as it holds all

the different parts including the transmission and the electronic circuitry. The mechanical

assembly of the vehicle also consists of the drive train of the vehicle which is responsible

for movement of the vehicle from one point to another.

The vehicle is designed to be operated on battery. When the vehicle receives the

commands from the android device the vehicles transmission system consisting of the

electrical motors drives the vehicle.

2) The microcontroller board:
The microcontroller used here is ATMELS AVR ATMEGA MICROCONTROLLER with

Arduino firmware. A microcontroller (sometimes abbreviated C, uC or MCU) is a

small computer on a single integrated circuit containing a processor core, memory, and

programmable input/output peripherals. Program memory in the form of NOR flash or

OTP ROM is also often included on chip, as well as a typically small amount of RAM.

Microcontrollers are designed for embedded applications, in contrast to the

microprocessors used in personal computers or other general purpose applications.

The Atmel AVR is a CMOS 8-bit microcontroller based on the AVR RISC architecture.

By executing powerful instructions in a single clock cycle, the ATmega achieves

throughputs approaching 1MIPS per MHz, allowing the system designer to optimize

power consumption versus processing speed.

The microcontroller board is interfaced with the Bluetooth which receives the incoming

signals from the android device. The microcontroller then processes the signals and then

takes the decisions based on the program written.

Thus this module forms the important component of the android controlled robotic

vehicle.

3) The Bluetooth and the android interface:

The Bluetooth and the android interface is the module which actually works in the

background. The Bluetooth is interfaced to the microcontroller. When the android

 application sends a signal the Bluetooth interfaced with the microcontroller board acts as

a receiver and receives the signal over the serial interface.

The Bluetooth then transfers the received signal to the microcontroller to process and

take respective action.

4) The smart accident avoidance system:
The vehicle is also equipped with smart accident avoidance system. This system consists

of an obstacle sensor. The sensor is also interfaced to the microcontroller board.

Whenever vehicle is too close to any obstacle this circuitry is activated. This

automatically halts the vehicle whenever it senses the object or another vehicle to close to

this vehicle.
Thus this makes a way for smart accident control system.

By bringing together all these modules we can make a fully functional android controlled

vehicle which can be controlled by sending the signals from the android enabled cell

phone.
 Block Diagram:

The following block diagram shows the complete working of the android controlled robot.

Android enabled cell phone is used

to send the signals to the vehicle

The Mechanical assembly. (The

Vehicle)

Bluetooth module The accident avoidance

system

Microcontroller
References:

1) Textbook of automobile engineering by Kripal Singh.

2) Microcontrollers by Godse Bakshi.
3) Beginning Arduino by Mcroberts.