Project

# Title Team Members TA Documents Sponsor
40 Power Budget Automation System
 Hai Vo
Ho Chuen Tsang
Vi Tran
 Igor Fedorov design_document0.pdf
final_paper0.pdf
presentation0.ppt
proposal0.pdf
Our project goal is to make a home power budget control system for saving energy in homes or apartment more efficiently. The system will allow users to control electricity directly or remotely in particular rooms or anywhere in the entire house. The system includes one central controlled box (the brain of control system) and a sensor boxes.
The project will focus on the processing control system. The controller will be able to navigate power consumption in the house based on the budget management (dynamic prioritization). The goal is to avoid going over a certain power limit. Supposed there are a few rooms having multiple outlets inside. We will assign priority to each room or each outlet. The rooms/outlets with lower priority will be restricted with a power limit. The highest priority room/outlet will have the power before anything happens. The sensor system will be implemented in those small boxes which placed in each room. The small boxes will be built with the microcontroller, IR sensors, current sensors, and bluetooth/RF transceivers. If someone is in the room, the sensor system will recognize and send the signal to the center box and bump up the priority a bit. And the setting will add into the schedule of the center boxes. After a certain amount of time, if there is no one in the particular area, the system will automatically turn off the power to that area.
We will program the control box to remember these setting and generate a schedule to manage and distribute power efficiently. Building the brain - a control unit is the core of this project. To design the learning ability of the brain system, we will figure out the algorithm and the decision making to run on inexpensive pieces of hardware. Combining the features (Learning ability and priority setting) makes home budget saving more optimal and affordable.

Cloud-controlled quadcopter

Anuraag Vankayala, Amrutha Vasili

Cloud-controlled quadcopter

Featured Project

Idea:

To build a GPS-assisted, cloud-controlled quadcopter, for consumer-friendly aerial photography.

Design/Build:

We will be building a quad from the frame up. The four motors will each have electronic speed controllers,to balance and handle control inputs received from an 8-bit microcontroller(AP),required for its flight. The firmware will be tweaked slightly to allow flight modes that our project specifically requires. A companion computer such as the Erle Brain will be connected to the AP and to the cloud(EC2). We will build a codebase for the flight controller to navigate the quad. This would involve sending messages as per the MAVLink spec for sUAS between the companion computer and the AP to poll sensor data , voltage information , etc. The companion computer will also talk to the cloud via a UDP port to receive requests and process them via our code. Users make requests for media capture via a phone app that talks to the cloud via an internet connection.

Why is it worth doing:

There is currently no consumer-friendly solution that provides or lets anyone capture aerial photographs of them/their family/a nearby event via a simple tap on a phone. In fact, present day off-the-shelf alternatives offer relatively expensive solutions that require owning and carrying bulky equipment such as the quads/remotes. Our idea allows for safe and responsible use of drones as our proposed solution is autonomous, has several safety features, is context aware(terrain information , no fly zones , NOTAMs , etc.) and integrates with the federal airspace seamlessly.

End Product:

Quads that are ready for the connected world and are capable to fly autonomously, from the user standpoint, and can perform maneuvers safely with a very simplistic UI for the common user. Specifically, quads which are deployed on user's demand, without the hassle of ownership.

Similar products and comparison:

Current solutions include RTF (ready to fly) quads such as the DJI Phantom and the Kickstarter project, Lily,that are heavily user-dependent or user-centric.The Phantom requires you to carry a bulky remote with multiple antennas. Moreover,the flight radius could be reduced by interference from nearby conditions.Lily requires the user to carry a tracking device on them. You can not have Lily shoot a subject that is not you. Lily can have a maximum altitude of 15 m above you and that is below the tree line,prone to crashes.

Our solution differs in several ways.Our solution intends to be location and/or event-centric. We propose that the users need not own quads and user can capture a moment with a phone.As long as any of the users are in the service area and the weather conditions are permissible, safety and knowledge of controlling the quad are all abstracted. The only question left to the user is what should be in the picture at a given time.

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