How To Make Fire Fighting Robotic Vehicle, Its Application

With the growth in the field of robotics, human involvement has become very less and also automatons are being widely used for security purpose. Day by day, fire accidents have become very common. Sometimes, it may lead to the danger that makes it hard for the firemen to save human life. In these cases, a robot is designed to guard human lives, wealth, and environments from the fire accidents namely fire fighting robotic vehicle. This robot project is an advanced and very useful project for engineering students, who are fascinated to robotics. This project uses RF technology for remote operation & also 8051 microcontrollers. This robot is capable of noticing a fire if a house catches fire when they not present in the house, while somebody in the house is either sleeping. By means of this robot, people and belongings can be protected from fire accidents.

What is a Fire Fighting Robotic Vehicle?

There are many prospects of fire in any far away area or in an industry. For example, in cotton mills, garments go-downs, and fuel storage tanks, electric leaks may consequence in immense fire and also damaged. In some cases, fire accidents may cause heavy losses both financially and by taking lives.

Firefighting robotic vehicles are very helpful to guard wealth, human lives, and surroundings. This robot is built with an embedded system. It is capable of directing alone on a displayed floor while dynamically scanning the flames of fire.These robots are designed in such a way that it hunts a fire, & soaks it before the fire could spread out of range and control.

This type of robot will work with firefighters faster or later, thus really reducing the danger of damage to victims. Apart from this, it will also help generate interest along with the inventions in the field of robotics while working towards a functional and available solution to protect lives and moderate the danger to property.

RF based Fire Fighting Robotic Vehicle

The main goal of this fire fighting robotic vehicle project is to design a robot by using RF technology for remote operation.

AT89C2051 Microcontroller

It is a smaller computer and it has on-chip RAM, ROM, I/O ports. The features of MC 2051 include the following.

• 2051 is a 20-pin type of the 8051.
• Fully Static Operation ranges from 0 Hz to 24 MHz
• Two-level Program Memory Lock
• Internal RAM is 128 x 8-bit
• 15-Programmable I/O Lines
• 16-bit Timer/Counters-2
• Interrupt Sources-6
• Programmable Serial UART Channel
• Direct LED Drive Outputs
• On-chip Analog Comparator
• Low-power Idle & Power-down Modes

Features of MC 8052

• 8K Bytes of ISP (In-System Programmable) Flash Memory
• Operating Range is 4.0V to 5.5V
• Fully Static Operation: 0 Hz to 33 MHz
• 256 x 8-bit Internal RAM
• 32 Programmable I/O Lines
• 16-bit Timer/Counters-3
• Interrupt Sources-8
• Full Duplex UART Serial Channel

RF Remote Control

• The circuit uses HT 12E, HT 12D encoder, and decoder.
• 433MHz, ASK transmitter and receiver are used for the remote control.

Features of RF

• 100 Meters range in open space (Standard Conditions)
• RX Receiver Frequency is 433 MHz
• RX Typical Sensitivity is 105 dBm
• RX Supply Current is 3.5 mA
• RX IF Frequency is 1MHz
• Low Power Consumption
• Easy For Application
• RX Operating Voltage is 5V
• TX Frequency Range is 433.92 MHz
• TX Supply Voltage is 3V ~ 6V
• TX Out Put Power is 4 ~ 12 dBm

RF Encoder & Decoder

• The HT 12E Encoder ICs are a series of CMOS LSIs for Remote Control system applications. They are capable of Encoding 12 bits of information which consist of N address bits and 12-N data bits.
• The HT 12D ICs are a series of CMOS LSIs for remote control system applications.
• These encoder and decoder are paired with the same number of address & data format should be selected for proper operation.
• The Decoder receives the serial address and data from its corresponding decoder, transmitted by a carrier using an RF transmission medium and gives output to the output pins after processing the data.

MOTOR driver L293D

• L293D is a dual H-bridge motor driver integrated circuit (IC).
  Motor drivers act as current amplifiers since they take a low-current control signal and provide a high-current signal.
• This higher current signal is used to drive the motors.
• L293D contains two inbuilt H-bridge driver circuits. In its common mode of operation, two DC motors can be driven simultaneously, both in forward and reverse direction.

Operation of Motor Driver

• L293D has 2 sets of arrangements where one set has input 1, input 2, output 1 and output 2 and another set has input 3, input 4, output 3 and output 4, according to block diagram of pin no 2 & 7 are high then pin no 3 & 6 are also high.
• If enable 1 and pin number 2 is high leaving pin number 7 as low, then the motor rotates in a forward direction.
• If enable 2 and pin number 10 are high leaving pin number 15 as low, then the motor rotates in the forward direction.
• If enable 1 and pin number 2 are low leaving pin number 7 as high, then the motor rotates in the reverse direction.
• If enable 2 and pin number 15 is high leaving pin number 10 as low, then the motor rotates in the forward direction.

Working on Project

The project uses HT12E Encoder which converts 4-bit data to serial output which is then fed to the RF module for transmitting the same to be received by the receiver RF module the output of which is fed to HT12D the serial decoder IC, the output of which is fed to the controller. The transmitting end MC is connected to a set of the pushbutton. Thus, while a particular button is pressed the program executed, delivers corresponding 4-bit data which are then transmitted serially at port 1.The data so received at the receiver end of port 1 operates the motor through motor driver IC L293D as required being interfaced from the Microcontroller output port 2.

Thus, while a particular button is pressed the program executed, delivers corresponding 4-bit data which are then transmitted serially at port 1.The data so received at the receiver end of port 1 operates the motor through motor driver IC L293D as required being interfaced from the Microcontroller output port 2.

The transmitter is powered by a 6v battery in series with a silicon diode to finally develop required voltage for micro controller circuit. The receiver is powered by a 12v battery in series with a silicon diode to protect the circuits from accidental reverse battery connection. 5V DC out of the 12V available from regulator IC 7805 is fed to the controller, decoder, the motor driver IC L293D pin 8 for the operation of the motor.The receiving unit uses one more motor driver IC L293D for driving one DC Motor for arm operation with a boom mounted on its shaft.

At the end of the shaft a nozzle is connected to a water tank mounted water pump which is powered from “NO” contacts of a relay that is driven by transistor Q1 from the output of MC pin 15, thus in the event of a fire the robotic vehicle is moved over to the location from operating the left, right, forward & backward button etc. After it reaches the site the nozzle mounted motor takes a position through the water on the fire from the water tank mounted DC pump actuated by the relay RL1. Thus the fire can be extinguished.

Software Requirements

• Keil an ARM Company makes C compilers, macro assemblers, real-time kernels, debuggers, simulators, integrated environments, evaluation boards, and emulators for ARM7/ARM9/Cortex-M3, XC16x/C16x/ST10, 251, and 8051 MCU families.
• Compilers are programs used to convert a High-Level Language to object code. Desktop compilers produce an output object code for the underlying microprocessor, but not for other microprocessors. i.e., the programs written in one of the HLL like ‘C’ will compile the code to run on the system for a particular processor like x86 (underlying microprocessor in the computer).
• For example, compilers for Dos platform is different from the Compilers for Unix platform So if one wants to define a compiler then the compiler is a program that translates source code into object code.

In future, this project can be developed by interfacing it with a wireless camera so that the person can view the controlling operation of the robot remotely on a display. We believe that you might have got a better understanding of this fire fighting robotic vehicle project. Furthermore, for any queries regarding this concept, or to implement fire fighting robotics projects for engineering students, please give your feedback by commenting in the comment section below.