Taking Dimension Measurement to The Digital Level [part 2]

WIRELESS DIGITAL DISTANT DIMENSION DETECTING DEVICE (WDDDDD) [part 2 – continuation]

A proposed sensor fusion technique which is less costly both economically and computationally, that will allow a wireless digital distance dimension detecting device to detect an obstacle, find the distance and also measure the size of the obstacle. Our system uses a mobile phone camera and an ultrasonic transceiver device to achieve this. We use the range data collected by the ultrasonic sensor with the image captured by the camera for object detection and object size measurement. Figure 1 below is the block diagram of the proposed system.

The ultrasonic sensor detects an object by transmitting pulses of microwave and wait to get the reflection of the microwave. If the obstacle/object is within the range of the sensitivity of the ultrasonic sensor the transmitted wave is reflected by that obstacle and the reflected wave finds it way back to the ultrasonic sensor receiver.

The micro-controller module calculates the time of transmission and the time the reflected wave gets back to the ultrasonic sensor receiver, and using the speed of electromagnetic wave the distance of the object from the ultrasonic transceiver sensor is computed by the micro-controller. The distance is then communicated to the mobile phone app.

The mobile phone app request for the value of the distance of the object from the system and uses the value together with the information captured by its camera to compute the dimension of the object detected. The value of the dimension is shown on the phone screen.

Equipment/Component Required

1. Ultrasonic Transceiver Sensor
2. Micro-controller
3. Bluetooth Module
4. Mobile Phone
5. Power Supply Unit

The Bluetooth module is what is intended to be used for interfacing the micro-controller to the mobile phone. Once the phone wants to measure the dimension of an object it will send a message via Bluetooth communication to the microelectronic to get the distance of the object from the system for use by the app.

Since the system is proposed to be implemented, at the production level, the communication between the Bluetooth and the micro-controller system shouldn’t need an external cable connections. However, for designing and constructing the prototype, the systems are not integrated internally into a single device so the communication between the micro-controller system and the mobile phone can either be achieve using a wireless communication such as Bluetooth, infrared etc. or a wired communication. The wired communication will however make the system less isolated and less robust.

At the prototype level, the micro-controller system will still need an external power supply to power it other than that of the mobile phone which is usually coupled to the mobile phone and there is usually not a means of connecting cables to the terminals. Usually, most micro-controllers are powered by 5 Volts power supply,  so the mobile phone could still power both system but this is more easily accomplished if the systems are internally integrated together to produce a single smart mobile phone. The coupling of the system to come up with a single smart mobile phone will be more appreciated by the targeted users.