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| Home / How To / Education |
 | Selecting the right sensors
Jeff Clayton 02 Nov 2000
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| Picking the right sensors for your robot is very important. sensors are the devices used
in interfacing a robot to its environment. The first thing to do is decide what you
want the robot to do. Will it have phototropic behavior? obstacle avoidance?
distance measurment? wheel encoders? sound detection?.......etc
There are many many different sensors to choose from. how do you know
which one is right?
Lets take object detection. Will the robot detect objects using tactile sensors?
modulated IR? Sonar? Lets say we have a robot that we want to use IR object detection.
Think ahead about what you want your robot to do. do you want a simple back up and
turn the right way behavior? or do you want the robot to know the exact distance of the object.
for the simple IR detector, a small modulated Ir circuit can be used. Two IR LED's
and an IR detector. For the distance measurment, you need to know how far the robot
will need to see. for a small slow moving robot, IR rangers would be an ideal choice.
They can see up to 80cm away. for a fast robot, Sonar would probably be a good choice.
Sonar is a powerful way to detect objects. the poloroid unit has a range of 35ft.
Bumper sensors are another way to detect an object. these sensors are usually the back
up in case the other sensors fail somehow.
This write-up will be added to as my time permits.
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