Animatronic Hand Project

Project Final Report for A.R.M.
(Animatronic Rescue Module)

Department of EEE, Ahsanullah University of Science & Technology.

Project Supervisor: Hasib Md. Abid Bin Farid

Team name: AUST TetraVolt

Team Members: Shaer Ahmed, M.Irfanuzzaman, Rakib-Ur-Raihan, Ahmed Raonak Himel

Published on: February 25, 2016

Synopsis of the Project

Automatization is the feat of the modern civilization. For some years now, the key goal is to replace the need of human help with robots that have lines of codes as their brain. But even with the advent of new technology and sophisticated programming language, there are some tasks still too complicated for droids. These tasks need the fine touch of a human to execute an operation precisely and with intricate details. This is why animatronics was developed. Animatronics is using electronic machines or robots which can animate or mimic human gestures. Here we are presenting an animatronic hand which accurately resembles a human hand and can mimic the gestures by a human.

Time and financial constraint prevented us from executing our original plan which was to build an unmanned rescue robot that can be operated by gestures from the video feed it sends wirelessly. Instead we have developed the animatronic hand that can be used in the rescue bot.

Function and Implementation

This animatronic hand can mimic the hand gestures of a human operator. It can move its fingers individually from the instructions.

Designing

The hand was designed from scratch using 3D designing tool Google Sketchup®, maintaining the proportions. The schematic was cut onto an acrylic sheet using laser to get the micrometer level precision we wanted. As the strings, we have chosen badminton strings which can withstand high tension. Widely popular development board Arduino® UNO has been used as the platform, which has an ATMEL ATMega 328p as the processing chip. To sense the bending of the fingers, we have opted for Infrared sensor instead of flex sensors to keep the cost minimal. To get rid of the interference due to sunlight’s infrared ray, we have built a cleverly designed device, which acts as a black box. To replicate the 6DOF movement of human arm, we have used MEMS (Micro Electro-Mechanical System) Gyroscope + Acceleration sensor. 5 servos control the fingers and arms from instructions by the Arduino.

Uniqueness:

From a bird’s eye view, it may seem that our project is pretty straight forward. But if someone takes a close look to our project, the uniqueness will become very clear. At first, we have implemented most used tools in a new way. This implementation has given our project versatility & cost effectiveness both. Almost all the animatronic robots are costly because of using some costly tools such as “Flex sensors”. But this tool increases the cost of the project about two times. That’s where we come in with our unique feature. We are using IR sensors which are low in cost & versatile. The IR sensors will measure the distance & the servo motors will rotate according to the command which results in moving the fingers of the animatronic hand.

Why hand?

Hand is the most useful body organ in a human body. The dexterity of hand gives human being a capability of accomplishing wide range of activities which is incomparable to any other living beings. That’s why we were interested in hand. We knew the capability of a human hand is boundless but we attempted to use our creativity & integrity to the fullest extent to give birth to a new kind of rescue bot.

Used Components

Acrylic made hand.
Arduino UNO
MPU-6050 Gyro + Accelerator Sensor (GY-521 Breakout Board)
MG-995 Servo motors
TCRT5000 Infra-red sensors.
Bread board
Jumper wires

Circuit Diagram

Code

#include <Servo.h>

//Servo thumb;

Servo index;

Servo middle;

Servo ring;

//Servo pinky;

//int ir_thumb = 0;

int ir_index = 1;

int ir_middle = 2;

int ir_ring = 3;

//int ir_pinky = 4;

//int val_thumb;

int val_index;

int val_middle;

int val_ring;

//int val_pinky;

void setup()

{

//thumb.attach(3);

index.attach(9);

middle.attach(10);

ring.attach(11);

//pinky.attach(10);

}

void loop()

{

//val_thumb = analogRead (ir_thumb);wdw

//val_thumb = map(val_thumb, 0, 1023, 0, 180);

//thumb.write(val_thumb);

//delay(1);

val_index = analogRead (ir_index);

val_index = map(val_index, 0, 1023, 0, 180);

index.write(val_index);

delay(1);

val_middle = analogRead (ir_middle);

val_middle = map(val_middle, 0, 1023, 180, 0);

middle.write(val_middle);

delay(1);

val_ring = analogRead (ir_ring);

val_ring = map(val_ring, 0, 1023, 0, 180);

ring.write(val_ring);

delay(1);

//val_pinky = analogRead (ir_pinky);

//val_pinky = map(val_pinky, 0, 1023, 0, 180);

//pinky.write(val_pinky);

//delay(1);

}

Picture Gallery

Troubleshooting

Giving our unique idea a materialistic shape, we had to be very diligent & goal oriented. To the way of giving the idea a shape, we had to face some real problems & also had to solve the problems. At first, our hand was acrylic made which showed less reliability than we expected. The main challenge was to move the fingers individually using strings. We had to channel through the hinges to place the strings which increased the degrees of freedom. This could be a lot easier if the making was according to our design. There were some serious flaws which we had to overcome with a huge level of difficulty.

Schedule of Cost

Future Development

Our original goal for the project was to develop an unmanned animatronic rescue robot which can be controlled wirelessly by a human. If the operator moves his arm or fingers, the animatronic robot will be able to replicate that accordingly and will eventually help move or pick up an object. Two cleverly placed cameras and two microphones will feed the video wirelessly to an android device which will process the video by the Google Cardboard app and create a virtual reality experiance. This helps the controller to process the environment as if he was there with an accurate 3D experience which is essential to recognize shapes and distances. The barometric pressure sensor, temperature sensor will provide further information about the environment whereas the gyro and accelerometer sensor provides the information about the orientation of the rescue bot.

We will try to implement this animatronic hand to the Animatronic Rescue Mission Robot.

Conclusion

Maybe, this doesn’t look like such a great project from just a simple view. But the designing, complexity, uniqueness & versatility that is embedded in this project will compel anyone to think twice before placing this in the same row with other projects. Besides, this is just a start. We are cruising forward with great passion with this idea & we are determined that this will not be just a project. In the near future, we believe that this will have a greater purpose to serve in the practical life which will save countless of human lives.