Cougar Autonomous Robotic Transport (CART)

Thanks for reading our blog! If this is your first time seeing on our blog, we recommend you start at our first blog post . Progress since our last post (March 6 - March 20) According to our last blog post, we planned to mount all of our sensors onto the CART and have them operational. However, there have been numerous setbacks. The first (planned) setback was spring break. After a grueling week of midterms and project, we took a break and spent some time recuperating. As a result, productivity was low from 3/9 to 3/13. In addition to taking a break, we had other responsibilities ranging from job interviews to thesis projects. However, we planned to increase the amount of time dedicated to the CART (starting March 16th). Unfortunately, as you are no doubt aware, the COVID-19 outbreak was declared a pandemic, and the situation evolved rapidly. Over spring break, the university went from one extreme to the other - at first, we thought no classes would get cancelled. Now, all of o...

Thanks for reading our blog! If this is your first time seeing on our blog, we recommend you start at our first blog post . Progress since our last post (February 14 - March 6) We finally installed our odometry solution. We had to mount it externally, since we were not able to mount it on an axle within the motor that drives the CART (this is the typical implementation, and is what almost every car does). This is because we are limited to solutions that do not involve permanent modifications to the CART. To implement our odometry solution, we used 24 equally-spaced magnets (about every 2 inches or so) around the perimeter of the wheel. This provided a high angular resolution. We validated the odometer by comparing the reported speed to the estimated speeds provided by two different GPS-based speedometer apps on an iPhone 7. Odometry: Hall effect sensor mounted to the CART It has detected a magnet, so the LED is red After validating the odometer, we designed and 3D-printed ...