As the title says ALIRA which stands for Autonomous Localized Intelligent Robot Assistant. My goal is to create robots that can assist us in our day to day events. Lets face it we are not getting any younger and hopefully we can all work together in creating a robot that can help us all as we get older.
While this little bot may not look like much it has a lot working for it. It uses a MEGA 2560 PRO Embed and through header pins connects to another board that has the following: 2 Sharp IR Sensors, Lm298 motor driver, Emic2 TTS, 3 watt Amp, Compass, HC-05 Bluetooth, Doppler Sensor and 2 OLED screen (64x48).
I am using TinyML to read sensor input so that it can make its own planning for navigation. The two IR sensor are at an 11 degree angle pointing down. While this is a starting platform I do plan on moving to a larger platform once all testing is done.
Currently the little bot is able to perform the following functions: Navigate around freely choosing its own path, Stand Guard and do intruder alert when a person enters the room or crosses its vision. Sit on the desk and delivery words of inspiration.
After doing brief testing I have found that some items are not needed and some items need to be replaced.
The Emic2 is not needed as speech can be done directly through Bluetooth to a smart phone, so the Emic2 will be removed. The doppler sensor was a good idea but does not provide the resolution I wanted for intruder detection, it will be removed and replaced with an AMG8833 Thermal array.
Adding the AMG8833 Thermal array opens up a new door as it can be used to track movement based on heat, so the robot could follow the user around based on thermal detection.
While this is just a small platform to start with I can see by developing a bot from a small platform will eventually have benefits.
The total size of what I will call my ArdBrain is 80x60x20 CM so it could fit into just about any size bot.
For biped robots the LM298 could be replaced with a servo controller.
Soon I will post a video, until then thank you for taking the time to view my project.
