Projects
As a professional in the engineering field, I find that working on my own projects at my own pace helps sustain the passion, enthusiasm, curiosity and drive needed get to the forefront of modern engineering. It has also served as a means to learn and develop my skill in the usage of modern engineering tools.
Tricopter Simulation Project
A typical multicopter has 6 degrees of freedom, but they are restricted by the
dependence of translatory motion on its rotational motion . For instance, to
move forward, the drone has to rotate such that at least a component of thrust
is in the desired direction. This project aimed to test whether a tricopter could be designed such that its translatory motion is, to a certain extent, independent of its orientation. Giving 2 degrees of freedom to each of the three rotors has proven to be a viable method of achieving the desired outcome. The tricopter was designed on Autodesk Inventor & its mechanical properties were determined. The equations of motion were developed and a linearized state space form was determined. Using the state space form, a robust model-based LQR control system has been established. A video demonstrating the design and the basic simulations of the tricopter has been shown below.

Above: Tricopter Design

Above: Tricopter Simulation on MATLAB
Quadcopter Project
The aim of this project is to get familiar with the basic components required to build a simple quadcopter for automation. The components include but isn't limited to DC brushless motors, ESCs and IMUs. This project is meant to supplement the main project of building a uniquely designed automated tricopter. Under this project, knowledge of IMU sensors were developed. Sensor fusion techniques are being studied and determined to estimate state variables accurately.

Above: Quadcopter Top View


Above: Quadcopter
Attitude Heading Reference System
The aim of this project was to develop an Attitude Heading Reference System (AHRS) for the Drone project. An IMU (MPU9255) was used to develop a device that is capable of giving the angular velocities and orientation of the mechanical system on which it is installed. The desired data was derived from the fusion of the gyro, accelerometer and magnetometer readings. Computational work for sensor fusion was conducted on an Arduino Uno. In order to test and visualize the computed sensor data, a program was developed using C#. The program uses the sensor readings to animate a virtual 3D model. A video depicting the capabilities of the sensor and the windows program is shown below.


Automated Exploration Rover
The project explored the use of multiple ultrasonic sensors working in unison to create
an exploration rover capable of avoiding collision with obstacles in its environment.
Regarding the chassis, yes, it is just the box of an ipad. But it turns out that the build
quality of those boxes are just as remarkable as the ipad itself. This became evident
because despite several crashes during testing, the chassis held its own.
Six ultrasonic sensors (3 in the front and 3 in the back) were installed to help identify
obstacles in the exploration environment. All sensors were controlled using an arduino
uno, which sent an array of the sensor measurements to a raspberry pi. The arduino
also controlled a camera. The basic idea was to create a framework where multiple
arduinos were assigned to control a specific instrument and send instrumentation data
to a central processor (raspberry pi). Several instruments were added to this framework,
such as, a camera, a thermal sensor and an IMU. A video displaying some of the tests
conducted on this rig is shown below.

Automation Exploration Rover 2.0
Since the automated rover project showed promise, the next step was to design a chassis that was a bit more sophisticated than the ipad box. The modified rover was upgraded to a six-wheeled rover in which the 4 front wheels can rotate about a common axle to complement the terrain it traverses. This modification proved useful in driving over rough terrain with medium-sized obstacles rather than having to go around them. A
3D model was first designed and perfected using Autodesk Inventor. After finalizing the design, the panels of the chassis were designed on Autodesk Illustrator and the panels were cut out on acrylic sheets using an epilog laser cutter. The front and back panels had 3 rectangular holes each to attach the 6 ultrasonic sensors All panels were assembled using nuts and bolts. PVC pipes were used as the axle and shafts that held the DC motors of the wheels. New motors and wheels were required to compensate for the change in mass of the rover. The new motors had a higher torque capacity. The motors were mounted to the shaft using 3D printed motor holders designed on Autodesk Inventor and 3D printed using a makerbot 3D printer. The material used was ABS. Tests were conducted to check its ability to drive over obstacles and avoid them if they are to large to drive over. A video demonstrating its abilities is shown below.
