Design and Development of the Robots using PIC18F4550 microcontroller

Ramanan Subramanian B.E Biomedical

Email id: ramananbiomedical@gmail.com

In this project, I have designed and developed a robot made using PIC 18F4550
microcontroller, With 2 motors, 1 led, 1 photodiode or photosensor, wheels, AAA battery,
L293D which is a motor driver, and a comparator which is inbuilt in microcontroller. The
input system consists of the opto-coupler which is consisting of IR LED and IR sensor
mounted at the front end of the robot. The input system provide the analog signals that are fed
to the PIC microcontroller where signals are compared in the comparator. The output system
consists of the motor driver which drives the motor. A potentiometer is used to provide the
variable resistances to the comparator in the PIC microcontroller as reference voltage. The
voltage is regulated at 5V using a voltage regulator 7805.

In this robot designing and development, I have added an idea of making both line follower
and obstacle detection robots. The main difference between line follower and obstacle
detection robot is that the sensor input placements. When the LED and the photodiode bent
downwards, it just uses the reflectance method and will become a line follower robot for
identifying the white and black colors in the path of movement.

In the obstacle detecting robots, the LED and photo diodes are straightened, such that any
obstacles in the in front of the path can be easily identified. The following images show the
various views of the robot. In these images, you can view the difference in the input
placements. In obstacle detection robot, input sensors are straightened while in line follower
the input sensors are bent down.
Obstacle Detection Robot

Line Follower Robot

The programming is performed using the PIC development kit using the RS232 cable by the
software MPLAB IDE.