Project
| # | Title | Team Members | TA | Documents | Sponsor |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 72 | Smart Keys/Key Box |
Jacob Connor Mehul Kaushik Yingtong Hu |
William Zhang | design_document1.pdf design_document2.pdf design_document3.pdf final_paper1.docx final_paper2.pdf other1.pdf presentation1.pptx proposal1.pdf |
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| Group: Jacob Connor(jacobpc3): in-person, Mehul Kaushik(mehul2): online till march end, Yingtong Hu(yh15): online # Problem: My dad works at a car dealership, and they have a central location where they keep keys to the cars on the lot. Unfortunately, employees sometimes misplace the keys, forget to return them after using them for test drives, or the keys could even be stolen. Replacing keys takes time and money, and also poses a security concern. # Solution Overview: To combat all of these issues I'm proposing a smarter set of keys and a key box to house all of these and house some of the system's features. The keys would be able to be located by making sounds when looking for them. The key box system would be able to activate, deactivate the keys and give a direction to the key which the user is looking for. So we would need our keys and key box system to have the following: - A speaker that make sounds when the user is looking for the key (on keys) - A device sends out signals to the compass when the key is tracked (on keys) - A device received signals from the key box of activation and deactivation (on keys) - A switch that controls the activation and deactivation of the keys (on keys) - A compass that receives signals from the key and gives directions to the key which is missing (on key box) - A central processing system that sends out signals that activate or deactivate the keys that are out of distance range, which means they are too far away to be found or stolen (on key box) # Speaker The speakers would be small enough to be put on the keys and powered by motors that are remotely controlled by the key box. When the user presses the button or clicks on the key box, the speaker will make sounds that large enough to be heard. # Compass Keys would send out signals to the key box when tracked, then the key box would have a direction of the specific key, thus helping the user to find the key. (We are still weighing our options for how we should accomplish this, but currently thinking about using a microwave receiver/transmitter.) # Controller module This module controls the activation and deactivation of keys. Keys will have an inner switch on each of them that can only be turned up and off by this module. The switch would receive signals from this module and work as the signals indicate. # Key Deactivation For cars with physical keys, we could use actuators that extend a metal piece into place that prevents the key from entering the car's key hole. This would mean the key activation module may sit on the key as a jacket-like casing. For keys with no physical keys that solution would be slightly different (like disabling the key fob’s ability to unlock the vehicle so that they couldn’t reach the push button start.) # Criterion for Success: - Keys that are within certain distance can be tracked easily by sound and direction hints - Keys that are out of the distance range after a specified amount of time and are unaccounted for will be deactivated automatically (for example, if the salesman forgets where the keys are and loses them, there’s a chance they were stolen and should be deactivated, but if the car was purchased by a customer, obviously the key would still be gone but should not be deactivated) - Keys are small, so all the implementations on the keys should be small enough for keys to carry. - The ability to handle a large quantity of keys |
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