SER301 Electromechanical Systems Design

For our project, we will be expanding on the first suggested project, “a tennis ball tracking system”. We will be creating a system that will be able to dynamically project a laser onto a randomly bouncing ping-pong ball.

Based on the guidance of our lecturer we will be breaking up our initial goal into three major milestones to ensure that we are able to successfully complete it,

Stage 1 – A system to project a laser onto a ball moving in a pendular motion.
Stage 2 – A system to project a laser onto a bouncing ball at a fixed distance.
Stage 3 – A system to project a laser onto a randomly bouncing and located ball.

Our first stage is analogous to the first suggested project, and we believe will be a good starting goal to ensure that everything is working as expected. Our second stage will allow the ball to move in a much less controlled manner, and will require our system to react much quicker and with greater accuracy. Our third, and final, proposed stage will require the resolution of depth and again place more emphasis on the accuracy and precision of our system.

With these goals in mind we will be able to compose our list of expected problems that we will need to overcome in order for our system to be deemed a “success”. For our initial stage we will need:

Accurately resolve the location of the ball

Accurately place a laser onto the located ball For our second stage:

Quickly resolve the ball’s location

A laser guidance system that is able to handle the ball’s rapid speed changes

For our third stage

Resolve the ball’s distance from the system

A large enough range of motion of the laser guidance to match our parameters Further problems presented by the geologic separation of our team and other unique considerations:

Every team member must be able to easily sourced components
Our designs must be in a format that all team members have the tools to work with
Our designs must be able to be assembled by all team members
Our ball must be regular, standardised, and of a unique colour
Our camera must be able to resolve the colour of our ball
Our camera must be of sufficient resolution to allow useful data to be collected

Assumptions

At this time we are making several key assumptions:

That the monocular camera will be able to effectively resolve depth
That the camera will be able to reliably distinguish the ball in our standard lighting conditions
That our mechanical system will be able to accelerate fast enough to match the ball’s movements
That our mirrors will be able to withstand the potential forces without cracking, warping, or becoming compromised in any other fashion
That our laser source will be strong enough to enable our located mark to be seen in standard laboratory conditions, or daylight