Beruflich Dokumente
Kultur Dokumente
rigonz2@netscape.net
R0 July 2014
1.
This document describes the design and construction of a DIY scanner equipped with
ultrasonic sensors.
This particular scanner, here named as a tablet, is based on a rectangular hollow frame on
whose perimeter there are a number of static ultrasonic (US) range sensors. Items
introduced in the internal area or space defined by the tablet frame are detected by the
sensors, the information gathered is converted into the position of the item, and then into
control signals related to the position of the object.
2.
The tablet that has been constructed as shown in the attached pictures.
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3.
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The tablet described in this document is based on static sensors. The code controlling it
uses both Cartesian and polar coordinates depending on the computation requirements.
In order to determine the position of a point, two sensors are needed that overlap their
respective measurement areas: the point has to be within the active area shown in the
following diagram to be detected.
It follows that a first requirement of the tablet is that, for a given number of sensors and
given features of these sensors, the area on which point position readings can be done is
maximized. (The area on which point position readings can be done is calculated here as
the fraction of the tablet area on which at least two readings from different sensors can be
collected).
There is an exact solution to this geometrical problem, but it seems analytically complicated
because of the separation of the different domains as well as for the number of variables
involved. As an alternative, a series of statistical (Monte Carlo) simulation programs with
gradient optimization have been developed and run. The code for the main one is included
in Annex 1.
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The positions of the sensors that maximize the coverage ratios, as provided by the
simulation program, are summarized in the following diagrams.
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Figure 5: Geometrical Distribution of the Absolute Measurement Error (Point Detection; Length
of tablet 60 cm, Width 35 cm; Measuring Error Standard Deviation 10 mm; Left: Average Absolute
Error, cm; Right: Probability of Measurement Calculation Impossibility due to Measurement Error )
Absolute errors are then minimized, on average, if the largest of the measurement angles
(from the segment joining both sensors) exceeds ~20.
3.4. Object Detection
The actual elements to be detected by the sensors are not points: positioning errors will
then happen if the system described in 3.3 is used with real objects, as shown in this
diagram:
There is no complete solution for this problem, but several relatively easy alternative
approximations are available:
assume that the object has a given shape and dimension (f.eg. a circular shape of
given radius) and determine the center of the circle from two distance measurements;
use three sensors and assimilate the real object to the circle that fits into the three
distance readings;
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use three or more sensors and determine the position of the object from the position
of the pairs of adjacent distance measurements.
The tablet described in this document makes use of the three options, depending on the
availability of distance measurements.
3.5. Hardware and Software of the Scanning Tablet
3.5.1. Harwdware
The ultrasonic sensors are HC-SR04, of unknown brand, and the device is run with an
Arduino mini pro.
As per the tests conducted,1 the operational specifications of the sensors are:
FOV (full cone): horizontal ~20, vertical ~13.
Spatial resolution (full cone): ~0.6-1.4.
Range: tested from 5 to 200 cm.
Accuracy: relative error ~0-5%; absolute error ~-0.5/-1.5 cm.
Precision: standard deviation ~0.1-0.5 cm.
3.5.2. Software
The tablet is operated under Arduino. The sketch running it is included in Annex 2.
The code is based around the following main functional blocks:
Geometry and Sensor Properties.
The dimensions of the tablet, and the number, position and orientation of the sensors
are defined, together with the physical properties of the sensors relevant for the
measurements.
The ambient temperature is also provided here.
Readings
All the sensors are read in sequence, and then the calculations proceed for the group
of results.
Data Filtering
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4.
ANNEXES
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