This thesis presents the design, construction and experiments done on a microcontroller board called 'SMARTY BOARD' targeted at small mobile robot applications. The primary motivation for this work was the lack of commercially available and cheap controller boards that would have all their components including interfaces on a single board. Having a single board simplifies the construction of programmable robots that can be used as platforms for teaching and learning robotics. Reducing the cost of the board as much as possible was one of the main design objectives. The target user groups for this device are the secondary and tertiary students, and hobbyists. Previous studies have shown that equipment cost is one of the major obstacles for teaching robotics in Australia. The other design objectives were robustness, reliability and functionality of the board. Most of the early technological learners such as high school students lack experience and expert knowledge for interfacing a controller board with other components. To prevent the learners from making errors, connectors on our board have been made foolproof (the user cannot damage the components of the board by plugging cables in the wrong sockets). Commercially available designs lack these essential features. After reviewing the commercially available micro-controller boards with respect to their suitability as teaching tools, we concluded that none of the existing microcontroller boards met our requirements. We then designed a new controller board based on previous boards. The main advantage of this new controller board is that it is a single board whereas the other controller boards are multi-board. Moreover, it is more foolproof. The new controller board was demonstrated at high-school seminars. In these demonstrations the new controller board was used for controlling two robots that we built. These robots are available as kits. The response from the high school teachers was very positive. The board has been selected as the platform for a robotic competition.

Submitted by Roger Oliva Felix (roger.oliva.felix@hotmail.com) on 2018-08-17T18:58:00Z No. of bitstreams: 1 felix_dissertation.pdf: 7309569 bytes, checksum: 90790c5622c5031e74dcc461ccefb15b (MD5) / Rejected by Lucilene Cordeiro da Silva Messias null (lubiblio@bauru.unesp.br), reason: Solicitamos que realize uma nova submissão seguindo as orientações abaixo: 1 - Inserir no corpo do texto a ata de aprovação, pois é um item obrigatório. Agradecemos a compreensão. on 2018-08-21T12:19:26Z (GMT) / Submitted by Roger Oliva Felix (roger.oliva.felix@hotmail.com) on 2018-08-21T12:44:28Z No. of bitstreams: 1 felix_dissertation.pdf: 7309569 bytes, checksum: 90790c5622c5031e74dcc461ccefb15b (MD5) / Approved for entry into archive by Minervina Teixeira Lopes null (vina_lopes@bauru.unesp.br) on 2018-08-21T12:57:04Z (GMT) No. of bitstreams: 1 felix_ro_me_bauru.pdf: 7133378 bytes, checksum: 7876ad942a5467301d81cd82ddae630d (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2018-08-21T12:57:04Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 felix_ro_me_bauru.pdf: 7133378 bytes, checksum: 7876ad942a5467301d81cd82ddae630d (MD5) Previous issue date: 2018-07-27 / Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior (CAPES) / O presente trabalho aborda o estudo experimental das características não lineares de atrito interno em atuadores pneumáticos. Os atuadores pneumáticos contêm uma tecnologia limpa comparados com os atuadores hidráulicos, ótima relação entre potência e massa suportada, e baixo custo em relação a atuadores elétricos. Também possuem internamente características não lineares que influenciam no controle de um servoposicionador, incluindo principalmente a vedação do êmbolo com o perfil do atuador e a vedação da haste. Portanto, para obter a precisão de posicionamento é necessária uma caracterização do atrito interno. Os métodos utilizados para o desenvolvimento da pesquisa são: investigação do problema de atrito com o modelo LuGre; desenvolvimento do equipamento experimental com um controlador de baixo custo Raspberry Pi; e realização dos experimentos com a identificação automática de atrito em atuadores pneumáticos. Obtendo assim, a visualização gráfica da força de atrito em função da velocidade em regime permanente. A força de atrito em relação aos parâmetros do modelo é calculada em tempo real, possibilitando, dessa forma, a visualização do comportamento da força ao longo do deslocamento do êmbolo do atuador. Os resultados têm a finalidade de verificar as características de atrito do atuador pneumático através dos parâmetros identificados. Desse modo, é possível classificar o atuador pneumático mais adequado para aplicação em sistemas de posicionamento e monitorar o seu desgaste. / This work presents an experimental procedure for determination of the nonlinear characteristics of internal friction of pneumatic actuators. Pneumatic actuators are a clean technology compared to hydraulic actuators, have good relationship between power and supported mass, and low cost compared to electric actuators. They also have nonlinear characteristics which influence the control of the servo positioner, including mainly the piston seal with the intern surface of the pneumatic actuators and rod seal, therefore to get the positioning accuracy it is necessary a good characterization of internal friction. The methods used for the development of the research are: investigation of the friction problem with the LuGre model; development of experimental equipment with a low cost controller Raspberry Pi; and achievement of the experiments with the automatic identification of friction in pneumatic actuators. Thus, it is obtained the graphical visualization of the friction force as a function of the velocity in steady state. The friction force in relation to model parameters is calculated in real time, enabling the visualization of behaviour of pneumatic force along of displacement piston of the actuator. The results have as purpose verify the friction characteristics of the pneumatic actuator using the identified parameters, thus, it is possible to classify the best pneumatic actuator for application in positioning systems and to monitor the your wear.