Page 135 - Robot Design Handbook ROBOCON Malaysia 2019

Figure 5 : The design of the second from different views

2.2 Electronic Design

In the electronic design, the main system is the electronic circuits and power system

the connects the controller, the power system and the input-output components. Both of the

robots use Arduino Mega as their main-controller. Arduino is an open source micro-
controller platform that is easy to programme [8], has a lot of application examples, plugs

and play components, and is really cheap. The computing power is sufficient enough to
control both robots. Another advantage is the abundance of pins on the Arduino Mega.

The main power source of the system is supplied by 11.1 V Lipo batteries. The
Arduino runs on 5 V in which it has a regulator on board. The motor runs on 12 V and the

solenoid valves run on 24 V in which two 11.1 V Lipo batteries are connected in series.
Other important components include a LCD screen used as an interface to display messages

and also a four by four keypad to give instructions. The LCD screen is connected to the
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Arduino controller using I C connection and protocols. This is to ease the wiring and reduce
the usage of pins on the controller.

Another important component is the motor diver. A motor driver is needed to control
the speed and direction of a motor. Various types of motor driver are available in the market

depending on how many channel is needed, and the voltage and ampere it needs to tolerate.
In this project, 30 A, dual channel, bi-directional motor driver is used to drive motors on the

first robot. This is because the load of the robot is quite big. The second robot uses 13 A,

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