Project Ideas

Voice Controlled Outside Cover

The cover will be voice and Bluetooth activated for the user to roll out and roll in the cover. The project will have a small motor which is waterproof in case of rain to control the actions. The project will also be remote controlled to test the project and there will be a microprocessor which will determine when the cover is fully rolled out and rolled in. The project will be solar powered for power efficiency but will also have a secondary power supply which will be connected to the outlet for night use.

Ocean Cleaning Unit

The project will be a cleaning unit for the ocean which will pick up debris on the surface of the water. It will be solar powered, and it will have a small vacuum which will suck into its container. There will be a microprocessor which will dictate when the front pump will turn on for the vacuum to suction and a secondary pump for the expulsion of any water in the container. There will be a mesh which will catch the debris as its being pushed outside. The unit will have sensors on the inside of the container to indicate when full. The unit will have a GPS system which will allow the user to retrieve once full.

A vacuum robot able to go upstairs

The Roomba is great appliance which comes in handy when vacuuming the house but it can be a bit of a problem when the owner has a multi floor home. This project will be Roomba vacuum that will be able to go upstairs using duel motors, with a system that will allow it to go up along with a smart mapping system and stair detection software. The system for the Roomba to go upstairs will have leg stands underneath to push it. The team will be using an Arduino processor to .

Omnigenerator

In today's world power is essential for us to live our day-to-day lives. In times of emergencies, such as hurricanes from us in Florida, power is generated through running generators outsides our homes. These generators use gasoline to turn mechanical energy into electrical power. Instead of using solely fossil fuels, a more robust and efficient generator would use all the energy generation techniques to extract all the available energy that the environment has to offer. The Omnigenerator is that device; it has modules that plug-in and adapt to what the environment has to offer. A solar panel, wind turbine, and hydroelectric generator are available as energy producing modules alongside the gas power generator to produce a maximum level of power generation.

Air Purifier Diffuser

The air we breathe is as important as the water that we drink. For this reason, clean air is a desirable quality to have. The Air Purifier Diffuser is an at-home device that will clean the air from dust, skin cells, pet hair, dander, and dirt molecules. It uses a two-stage cleansing process with the first stage being a filter and the second stage that ionizes the air. After the air is filtered a diffuser chamber releases humidified essential oils into the stream to clean air to give the home a fresh and pleasant atmosphere. A microcontroller is used to control fan speeds, activate the diffuser, and give the device wireless capabilities.

Solar Water Generation from Air

As the human race continues to grow our need for clean drinking water rises with us. I propose a solution that is both environmentally friendly and plausable in almost any location around the world; it is called Solar Water Generation which operates based on the dew point of the local environment. A solar panel will provide the necessary power to run a small refrigeration cycle. The evaporator coil will be exposed to humid air from the outside, provided by an externally mounted fan, and condense the water molecules that are gaseous in the air. The condensation will drip down into a water collection tank where a water level sensor can tell the user how full the tank is. A microcontroller is used to control the temperature of the refrigeration cycle based on the outside air temperature; a minimum temperature difference between the humid air and evaporator coil will be used in order to increase efficiency of the system.

Flywheel Energy Storage

While green renewable energy is on the rise one technology that has been stunted is energy storage; our greatest choke to the grid is how to store the energy we produce. One such method of energy storage is by using a flywheel, a large rotational mass, to store mechanical energy. A solar panel and wind turbine will be outfitted to supply renewable energy to the system. They will power a motor that spins the flywheel for energy storage. When energy is desired from the system the motor runs in reverse as a generator to supply power from the rotating flywheel. A vacuum pump is added to draw out the air around the flywheel in order to reduce windage friction losses. A microcontroller monitors the rpm of the flywheel to determine appropriate charge and discharge intervals. The flywheel will be rotating on a set of bearing, either mechanical or magnetic. This system is not intended for commercial use, but rather, for residential use in our homes for individual families. We all have large appliances in our homes, such as an HVAC unit, refrigerator, oven, and more. Why not have an energy storage appliance in our homes as well?

Industrial Recycle Sorter

Ever since China enacted the National Sword Policy in 2018, China has stopped accepting 99.5% of recycled goods into their country. This policy has left a huge burden on the recycling industry here in America. We propose an automated solution for recycling plants to implement AI and robotics. The AI will be fitted with a camera/webcam to see the recyclables moving down the sorting line and recognize the objects for sorting. The python library Opencv will be tasked with image recognition and quality of match. A robotic pole will move in 3D space, grab the object, and place the object into its proper bin for sorting. Similar designs use vacuum pressure for grabbing and dropping.
Research that needs to be conducted:

Will a custom object library need to be made for Opencv to detect recyclables?
How fast do the objects move down the sorting line?
The robotic pole must "catch" the object moving down the line. Are there velocity and acceleration modules for calculating these projections?
How fast must the robotic pole move to grab an object and at what clock speed must it operate to sort efficiently?
How effective will the vacuum grabbing mechanism pick up objects of all different shapes and sizes? What would be the optimal method for grabbing?

Pool Alert

Do you have a pool and the kids or the pets are running around the pool? Ever have the fear that your child could fall in the pool without you knowing? Or try to get in your pool and find that there is some animal that has fallen or has jumped in? The solution to these problems is the Pool Alert. The project will use sensors to track disturbances in the water. When there is a significant disturbance the sensor will set off an alarm on the user's phone, a buzzer will sound alarming nearby users, an LED strip with flash red, and a live video feed will be sent to the user's phone through an app for confirmation. A 911 option will be embedded into the phone app to call authorities in case of an emergency. For night mode the LED light strip will cycle through the RGB color spectrum for a miniature light show. The Pool Alert system will be installed at the edge of the pool and be powered by a 120VAC outlet or by a solar panel add-on. The water sensor will be programmed to detect whether or not the device is set into the pool; this will allow the user to simply take the device out of the pool, which will activate sleep mode, and allow for people to swim freely.

The motivation for this project came from a video on Youtube of a boy who was swimming caught on a security camera. The video shows the boy getting into the deep end of the pool and he sinks to the bottom and tries to get out but is unable to the shallow end because he becomes disoriented. Around him there were people also in the pool who seem to think that the boy is just playing around. Finally after a few minutes of trying to get his head out of the water the boy begins to float and people around him finally realized that he had drowned and rush to help him. The video was very disturbing and considering that many houses in Florida have pools this could be a project that could help many people.