Autonomous Pet Entrance System (Team 02) ECE342-Sp21

This was a collaborative project to design and implement a system that would control a pet door. The desired features were automatic opening and locking without human interference, four user programmable times of when the pet can open or cannot open the door, usage monitoring when the pet uses the door, and emergency force override to allow the owner to open the door in the case emergencies. Some other considerations for the project were the strength of the door when locked, accuracy of how time was tracked, the means of storing the pet usage data, physically locking the door via solenoid so that it cannot be opened when it is not supposed to be, and being able to sufficiently power the motor to raise the door. We utilized three key technologies in this project that allowed the Arduino Uno to meet our requirements. For tracking time accurately, we used a Real Time Clock (RTC) module, which keeps tracks time to a high degree of precision, even when the rest of the system is powered off. For usage data logging, we used an external micro SD card and wrote dates and times to it. To run the motor and the solenoid, we implemented relays controlled by the Arduino that supplied sufficient current. The main challenge for us was working remotely; it introduced two problems of miscommunication and minimal opportunity for in-person collaboration during the implementation stage. Our most notable accomplishment on this project was working through the difficulties with teamwork and near continuous communication to bring the prototype to completion entirely functional. In the future, we would want to better plan out the layout of the system, and make sure that our blocks are thoroughly designed. Some areas for future improvements for the project are the transfer of data over Wi-Fi, designing an app to handle user interfacing, combined the two PCBs into one, and develop a singular enclosure that contains both the electronics and door.

1 Lifts 

Artifacts

Name Description
Project Summary A summary of the process for completing our project   Download
Main Arduino Program This file is the assembled code segments for main driver file (Done by Evan and Henok)   Download
Usage Times Document A text file that contains data for at what times the pet can open the door   Download
Developer Guide Explains setup and operation of the system, and it provides the artifacts of the development   Download
FAQ and Contact Sheet Anticipated questions about the project and their answers, as well as email contacts for the group members   Download
Project Summary Video Video overviewing the design problem, design approach, and the future prospects of the project   Link