National Robotics Competition (NRC) 2012 - Robot Connecting People SK2A ...

ALEXANDER & ALEXANDRA
THE HOME SECURITY DOG

Vision
To produce the cost effective robot that protects the human.

Mission
1. To make a robot that can protect and watch over the human and their properties.
2. To encourage people to use the latest technology that is cost effective if compare to human guard.
3. To produce the robot that employ vision technologies like human eyes.


Objectives
1. To build the Robotic Security Dog that can navigate by itself and can watch and alert its master when there is an intruder.
2. To produce the Robotic Security Dog that threatens the intruder when they come closer.
3. To program the Robotic Security Dog that has artificial intelligent that has the vision ability to do the scanning like radar.
4. The Robotic Security Dog also can be wireless controlled by human.

Introduction about the project in detail
The crime rates are up, and you’re afraid at home, at the office, around the neighborhood and in the car. How would you like to increase your safety with the help of a companion who has superhuman abilities, cares selflessly about your welfare, and will adore you even when others reject you? With some effort, you can find such companions – they’re dogs.

One of the earliest duties of the domestic dog was guarding the property of its owner, whether that property is land, livestock or his owner’s home.

There is a distinction between guard dogs and watch dogs.

A watchdog simply watches the home and alerts others to the intruder by bark vigorously at the presence of an intruder or in most situations they experience as out of the ordinary. Many small and toy dog breeds, which would not qualify as guard dogs are excellent watch dogs, as their only duty is to alert their owners with their barking.

Our project is to build the Robotics Guard Dog not only watches and alerts but also able to threatens the intruders when they come closer. This robotics guard dog has the ability to do the radar scan like human vision and controlled by human through Bluetooth connection.

Synopsis of the project
(a) Background
We used ideas we got from many online sources such as Wikipedia, Youtube, Google, etc to get ideas for the design of the robot. We also substituted the ideas from the pictures when building our robot.

A guard dog not only watches and alerts but also threatens the intruder to the point of retreat. Most guard dogs will instinctively do anything possible to protect their human family and the area they consider as their territory, ranging from dissuasion towards potential intruders until, eventually, attack. Fortunately, their intimidating appearance and low voice often is enough of a deterrent to any would-be intruder. Nevertheless, the trainability of a guardian dog should be on the top list of the qualities required of a guard dog. It is this quality that will ensure that the natural sense of territoriality and protectiveness of a guard dog remains within the limits set by the law.

It is important to understand that these dog breeds are typically very confident, with a dominant nature. They require early, consistent training and proper socialization from an experienced owner or from a professional dog trainer.

They are great guard dogs; they are very loyal and affectionate with their human families. They’re also one of the smartest breeds in all dogdom. The German Shepherd is now one of the most popular family and guard dogs. Their work as police dogs is legendary, as is their performance as a search and rescue dog. Also, some German Shepherds are very animal aggressive, so socialization is also important.


(b) Robot functionality
1) It can navigate in the house by itself. It will follow voices or noises made by thief. It also will avoid wall and navigate without hitting the object.

2) With Bluetooth connection, we can control the robot by using another NXT. The robot can move straight, reverse, turn left and turn right. The power or the speed of the robot also can be increased or decreased.

3) The robot can stop and do the radar scanning like human vision. It can detect objects up to 30 inches. When the object comes closer, it will make the sound louder. When the object goes far, the volume of the sound will be softening.



(c) Uniqueness and interactive behavior
1) The robot can navigate like human guard by itself.
2) The robot can be controlled by Bluetooth connection. We can control the direction and the speed of the robot.
3) The robot has artificial intelligent that has the vision ability to do the scanning like radar.


Designing and Building Process
(a) Concept and Implementation
With combination of all the motors and sensors, we have divided our robot, our robot to have the feature features like below:-

1. Robotic Security Dog that can navigate by itself and can watch and alert its master when there is an intruder.
2. To program the Robotic Security Dog that has artificial intelligent that has the vision ability to do the scanning like radar.
3. The Robotic Security Dog also can be wirelessly controlled by human.
4. The robot dog that can bark like real dog.

(b) Brainstorming and solution to the problem
1) If we do the radar scanning without the gear structure, some of the programming would not be easily done caused by the turning angle is small. So, we have used the 8t gear to drive the 40t gear. This will turn up to 5 times slower and the detection by the ultrasonic will be smooth.
2) The head gear will get stuck sometimes, we have tried out several design to make the turning of the gear become smooth.
3) It was the problem initially on the movement of the robot because of the weight of the robot. The front castor wheels on this robot work OK now on smooth hard floors because this robot has less than half of the total robot weight over the drive wheels.


(c) Engineering and stability of the structures
1) Two NXT Motors connected to port B and C is use for the movement action.
2) NXT Speaker -Allows the robot to make the bark sound.
3) NXT Motors connected to the port A for Neck Moving.
4) Sound Sensor - To detect the sound level and hearing the voice commands from the human.
5) Ultrasonic Sensor - For detecting the distance to objects to avoid them.
6) Touch Sensor – Used as remote control to control the movement of the robot.
7) NXT Buttons - Used to control the speed of the robot.

Programming
(a) Concept
After brainstorming with the group, we have gathered some programming techniques from the sample program we found from the Internet to program our robot.

1) Self-Navigating - The robot will go straight for 1 second or it founds something in front less 12 inches, the robot will stop. The neck of the robot will turn left. If it hears something, the robot will turn to left direction. If no sound is detected, it will turn its neck to right. If it hears something at this position, it will turn to right direction. If no, it will check if distance from the left direction if greater than right direction. Bigger distance value means more space. The robot will turn to that direction.
2) Remote Control – The robot can be remotely control using Bluetooth. Three NXT buttons are used to control the power or speed of the robot and the forward/reverse direction of the robot. The first two touch sensors are used to control the movement and the last touch sensor is used to start the radar scanning.

The Wiring, functionality and used in which mode of the input / output of the NXTs are listed in the table below.

NXT on the Home Security Dog

Port	Input / Output	Functionality
B	NXT Motor	Motion Movement.
A	NXT Motor	Neck Movement.
C	NXT Motor	Motion Movement.
2	Sound Sensor	Detect the sound level of the voice.
3	Sensor Ultrasonic	Detect the object in range.

NXT on the Remote Control

Port	Input / Output	Functionality
1	Touch Sensor	Movement.
2	Touch Sensor	Movement.
3	Touch Sensor	Radar Scanning.
NXT Left/Right	NXT Buttons	Increase / Decrease the power of the robot.
NXT Enter	NXT Buttons	Forward / Reverse direction of the robot.

(b) Brainstorming and solution to the problem
1) The initial program of this robot is that there is no barking sound. To make it like a real peg, we have found the dog barking sound on the internet. But the sound is in wav format. So, we are using a program call wav2rso.exe to convert the wav file into rso sound file which is recognized by the NXT.

2) Programming also a big challenge for us as we want to make an artificial intelligent robot. Luckily we get lot of guidance from our Mentor especially how to use the variables.

National Robotics Competition (NRC) 2012 - Robot Connecting People Alpha...

Mission
To produce successful young, creative and innovative generation with technical
information and technologies in robot designing.

Vision
To enable students to learn and apply their technical information
and technologies in robot designing skills in making robot which is able to
promote a National or Culture Heritage of Malaysia.

Objectives
1. To introduce students about Science and Technology.
2. To expose students with existence of robots that can give a lot of advantages of human.
3. To train students to cooperate with teammate and work together to build the best robot they could do.
4. To be a platform in mastering practical aspect in engineering and technology.

Introduction about the project in detail
A humanoid is something that has an appearance resembling a human being. More generally,
the term can refer to anything which uniquely human characteristics and/or
adaptations, such as the ability to walk in an upright position.
Our project is the build the humanoid robot that has an appearance resembling a human
being. Basically our robot can walk, more his shoulder, has ultrasonic eyes and
can recognize some color balls.

Introduction of the robot
1. Our robot, Alpha Rex 2.0, a social robot like human.
2. Description of the Robot

a. Two motors are used to act as the
movement control of the robot. Two touch
sensors are added on his legs are used to control the precision of the movement
of the robot.
b. The third motor is used to control the swinging of the shoulder.
c. Ultrasonic sensor is used to act like the eye of the robot.
d. The color sensor is to detect the color of the balls.

Synopsis of the project
(a) Background
We used ideas we got from many online sources such as Wikipedia, Youtube, Google, etc to get ideas for the design of the Basketball robot. We also substituted the ideas from the pictures when building our robot.

A humanoid robot is a robot that is based on the general structure of a human, such as a robot that walks on the two legs and has an upper torso, or a robot that has two arms, two legs and a head. A humanoid robot does not necessarily look convincingly like a real person, for example the ASIMO humanoid robot has a helmet instead of a face. Some humanoid robots may also have a ‘face’, with ‘eyes’ and ‘mouth’.

An android (male) or gynoid (female) is a humanoid robot designed to look as much like a real person as possible, although these words are frequently perceived to be synonymous with humanoid.

While there are many humanoid robots in fictional stories, some real humanoid robots have been developed since 1990s and some real human looking android robots have been developed since 2002.

A humanoid robot is an autonomous robot because it can adapt to changes in its environment or itself and continue to reach its goal. This is the main difference between humanoid and other kinds of robots.

ASIMO is a humanoid robot created by Honda. Introduced in 2000, ASIMO, which is an acronym for Advanced Step in Innovative Mobility, was created to be a helper to people. ASIMO is the first humanoid robot to walk on its own.

(b) Robot functionality
(c) Uniqueness and interactive behavior
The uniqueness of the robot is it is able to tell the human and recognize the green ball. When green ball is detected, Alpha Rex will dance for a while before it drops the ball. The other colors are detected, it will drop the ball immediately.

Designing and Building Process
(a) Concept and Implementation
Our concept is the build the robot that resemble human and able to communicate with human. Our idea is to design the robot that can talk, walk, dance, and recognize color as well as “seeing” objects.

(b) Brainstorming and solution to the problem
· The main building problem on this robot is the turning of the shoulder. We have modified and make some changes on the original design in order to make the turning smooth.
· Another challenge is we are using LEGO rechargeable battery instead of AA batteries. Because of the different size of the batteries, we have made some changes on the legs as well as on the body.

(c) Engineering and stability of the structures
The turning of the body is using two gears at the angle of 90 degrees.

Programming
(a) Concept
The concept of the programming is to allow the robot to see using ultrasonic sensor, to move using two NXT motors, to turn his shoulder using single NXT motor, to walk smoothly using two touch sensors and to recognize color. The Wiring and functionality of the input / output of the NXTs are listed in the table below.

Port	Input / Output	Functionality
B	Shoulder  Motor	Move the shoulder and throw the ball.
A	Left Motor	Control the left leg.
C	Right Motor	Control the right leg.
1	Touch  Sensor	Stop the Motor B when pressed.
2	Touch  Sensor	Stop the Motor C when pressed.
3	Color  Sensor	Detect the color of the ball.
4	Ultrasonic  Sensor	Detect the distance of the object.

The robot will wait for 0.5s and will start to detect object using the ultrasonic sensor. If some object is detected less than 25cm, the robot will start to move its leg. The touch sensor is used to move the robot in precise position.
After the robot move around 8 rotations, it will talk “Green” and then “Please” to human. So, we need to give it a ball. If green ball is detected, the robot will move its legs for a while before move his shoulder to drop the green ball. If other color is detected, the robot will move its shoulder and drop the ball immediately.