Senior Design Project Summaries: 2000-2001

EE 461, 462, 463 Senior Design Project
Fall and Spring Semesters 2000-2001

• Project #1 LIGHTENING FEED
• Project #2 ON BOARD DIAGNOSTIC SYSTEM
• Project #3 VOICE RECOGNITION REMOTE CONTROL CAR
• Project #4 A WIRELESS MILLENNIUM LIGHT BAR
• Project #5 MP3 CAR AUDIO
• Project #6 HOME INTERCOM SYSTEM
• Project #7 BROADBAND WIRELESS COMMUNICATION

Project #1 LIGHTENING FEED

By: Ashiqur Rahman, Kim Schueller, and Mark Mccutcheon
Advisor: Dr. J. Marks
Description: The sport of paintball originated nineteen years ago and has since evolved into a sport played by millions of people in over forty countries. One of the stock class (standard) pieces of equipment of a paintball gun used in this sport is a magazine or feed tube. This tube is utilized to load balls into the paintball marker or gun. This report goes into detail about the two-semester development process and the completion of a senior design project. The project consisted of the analog to digital conversion and the addition of several measurement devices to a recently patented paintball feed tube. The completion of the project was possible via software development using a Microchip PIC16C73A, new hardware design, and packaging. The measurement devices included in the project consist of a shot counter, countdown timer, chronograph, battery tester, user interface, data storage device, and threshold detector.

Project #2 ON BOARD DIAGNOSTIC SYSTEM

By: Gary Hillukka, Jonathan Kauhane, Benjamin Weber
Advisor: Dr. Joseph Marks
Description: This project contains the development of an on board diagnostic system. The on board diagnostic system allows the user to monitor a vehicle's function through a personal computer (PC) and keep a running log of vehicle sensor data. This project is broken up into four parts. First interfacing the vehicle's Electronic Control Module (ECM) to the PC. Next creating the software to display the vehicle's sensor information on the PC. Third interfacing the microcontroller to the ECM. Finally creating software to read the data stored in the microcontroller. This project is also expandable to control various systems on the vehicle and the ability to expand the system by measuring other sensors not currently installed on the car.

Project #3 VOICE RECOGNITION REMOTE CONTROL CAR

By: Thean Looi Kim and Jeffrey Ang
Advisor: Dr. J. M. Heneghan
Description: This project is concerned with implementing remote voice recognition hardware that will recognize the word commands to control a model car without manual intervention. Unlike the contemporary radio control car of today, where manual control is used, in this design voice commands will be used to control the model car. The voice recognition hardware will be incorporated into the remote control unit that comes with the model car. Typical commands such as forward, left, right, stop and head-beam lights on will be implemented. Sensor will be installed to stop the car to avoid front collision and voice control of head light beam will be incorporated. Our major goal is to utilize voice command to control the remote car.

Project #4 A WIRELESS MILLENNIUM LIGHT BAR

By: Deq Hussein and Roman Marjamaa
Advisor: Dr. Peter K. George
Description: Public Safety Vehicle lighting is entering the twentieth century with the aid of solid-state electronics, high power Light Emitting Diodes, and wireless data transmission. With the introduction of these technologies comes the possibility of more versatile and more efficient design strategies.

Emergency lighting can be controlled more effectively with the use of an RF remote controller. A Graphical User Interface on existing laptops decreases the amount of space needed on Public Safety Vehicle dashboards by decreasing the number of warning light control modules. The process of building a state-of-the-art wireless controlled light bar with these features are documented in this report.

Project #5 DESIGN AND IMPLEMENTATION OF A CAR AUDIO MP3 PLAYER

By: Michael T. Schock, Jason Langfield and Matthew Ethen
Advisor: Dr. J. Michael Heneghan
Description: The purpose of this project is to construct a car audio device to play MP3 music. A Graphical Use Interface (GUI) controlled docking station that interfaces with the PC via USB allows songs to be transferred to a portable hard drive. The player unit, which resides in the vehicle, retrieves the data from the hard drive and converts it to audio. The audio is then transferred via radio frequency to any receiver capable of receiving FM transmission.

Project #6 WIRELESS HOME INTERCOM SYSTEM

By: Alex Krueger, Bridget Bethke and Ray Melberg
Advisor: Dr. Ling Hou
Description: Wireless home intercom systems are an excellent solution for in-home communication. They are not only portable, but are a cost effective way of providing communications between different rooms or floors within a house.

Project #7 SYNCHRONIZED T1 COMMUNICATION LINK

By: Fahd Habeeb and Nadeem T. Chaudhry
Advisor: Dr. Yi Zheng
Description: Data communication is becoming an increasingly important part of our new hi-tech society. The industry is constantly trying to come up with efficient methods for transmission of data. The goal of our project is to develop a communication link between two PCs using a synchronized T-1 protocol. This T-1 link is initially designed for a 2.4 GHz wireless CDMA communication transceivers.

The initial design using ADSP2181 DSPs and Dallas T-1 generators was not successfully completed. Therefore, a different approach using T1 DSP boards is adopted. Two high-speed Digital Signal Processing (DSP) boards were programmed to generate and receive T-1 signal and two Xilinx Complex Programmable Logic Device (CPLD) were designed to clean the T-1 stream using flip-flops and buffers.