Search and Rescue Robot

Project Overview

For my advanced mechanical design course, a team of students and I were tasked with designing and building a robot capable of carrying out a search and rescue mission. The robot would have to pick up a kit containing medical supplies, navigate around obstacles, climb over difficult terrain, navigate through a narrow tunnel, and deliver the 'med kit' to the 'patient.'

Figure 1: A visual overview of the mission profile

Figure 2: Video showing early prototype

Figure 3: Cad model of assembled final design

My Role

I was responsible for 3 sections of this project: Fabricating prototypes, electromechanical systems, and microcontroller code.

Prototype Fabrication:

Manually machined aluminum components Bridgeport Mill
Turned HDPE and Teflon components on lathe
CNC'd gears and linkages for gripper arms on Haas VF-2D 3 axis CNC machine

Electromechanical Systems

Derived system constraints from mission parameters
Designed electromechanical subsystems, selected and purchased components, and created mission power budget
The robot's powertrain consisted of two Mini CIM DC motors powered by 12V 7Ah battery.
The robot is controlled by a Teensyduino microcontroller, with a Raspberry Pi running OpenCV for object detection taking over for certain autonomous tasks
The sensor loadout includes 3 IR proximity sensors, 2 photoresistors, and 1 accelerometer (3-axis)

Figure 4: Wiring Diagram for base electromechanical system

Figure 5: Schematic for final design implementation including sensor load out and Raspberry Pi

Microcontroller Code