KJ SOMAIYA COLLEGE OF ENGINEERING

ENGINEERING EXPLORATION AUDIT COURSE – SEM 4

AUTONOMOUS VACCUM CLEANER

NAMES OF PROJECT MEMBERS:

OMKAR KARNIK (SE MECHANICAL)

CHIRAG BHADRESHA (SE MECHANICAL)
MANIK SAFAYA (SE EXTC)
SHAHID SHAH (SE EXTC)
TABLE OF CONTENTS:

• PROJECT BACKGROUND

• OBJECTIVES
• CONCEPTUAL IDEAS AND DESIGN
1) SHAPE
I) DESIGN 1

2) VACCUMING MECHANISM
I) DESIGN 1
II) FLAWS IN DESIGN 1
III) DESIGN 2

• ELECTRONICS ASPECTS

• PROGRAMMING ASPECTS

• FUTURE ASPECTS OF THE PROJECT

• REFERENCES
PROJECT BACKGROUND

Cleaning has always been a monotonous and a tiring task since ages. Whether
the space to be cleaned is small or large, we can never expect that the area can be
cleaned very perfectly.
If we see the market today, we can see a variety of autonomous vaccum cleaning
robots being commercially sold. The price of these gadgets is however beyond 50k
INR.
The price itself prevents an Indian consumer to refrain from making the use of such
cutting edge technologies readily available in the market. Also, there are negligible
amount of robotic vaccum cleaners which are Indian originated making us to rely on
the foreign brands and the hefty price which comes with it.
List of some cleaning robots in the market
Roomba Series (i robot )
Neato series
Electrolux Trilobite

Looking at the present scenario of the current market, there arose a desperate need
to build a machine which could perform this task of cleaning and at the same time
require minimal amount of manual inputs from the user. Also ,the production cost of
the robot should be as minimal as possible so as to be used in the common
household.
OBJECTIVES

To design and fabricate a fully functional autonomous vacuum cleaner robot .

The robot will clean dry dust in the room under consideration.
The robot is fully autonomous requiring the user to switch on the robot and expect
the robot to function on its own.
To successfully detect the furniture and other objects placed in the room an avoid
hitting onto it.
To collect the dust and store it in a chamber in itself.
The dust collector chamber can be emptied as and when it gets full.
CONCEPTUAL IDEAS AND DESIGNS:

MECHANICAL ASPECTS:
SHAPE:
DESIGN 1:
There current robotic cleaners mostly are CIRCULAR or RECTANGULAR.
Each one of them has its own advantages and disadvantages.
The CIRCULAR shaped vaccum cleaner(ROOMBA SERIES) can move swiftly about its
own axis. It can perfectly avoid hitting obstacles . Whereas it cannot cover cleaning
the sharp edged corners of the room.
The RECTANGULAR shaped vaccum cleaner (NEATO SERIES) overcomes this difficulty.
It can sneek into the rectangular corners of the room . However the edges of the
robot itself cause a hinderance for its manoeuvrability and hence cannot avoid
hitting obstacles.

Taking into consideration both the pros and cons , we decided to make the shape of
the robot to be rectangular with rounded edges.
Hence, the robot can cover the corners of the room and also the manoeuvrability is
not compromised.

VACCUM MECHANISM:

While the robot is moving, we also have a task of taking in the dirt on the floor.So we
had to think of a vaccuming mechanism which can take in the dirt and storing it in a
chamber.

DESIGN 1:
Two rotating circular sweepers were placed at the corners of the front end of the
robot.
As the sweepers rotate (one clockwise another anticlockwise), such positioned that
the movement of the dirt collected will be directed under the body of the robot.
The dust driven under the body will be extracted by a sweeper brush placed on the
body of the robot.
The dust collected will be stored in a chamber inside the body of the robot.

FLAWS WITH DESIGN 1:

Actual dust collection cannot be effectively done as the scrubbers cannot take in all
the dirt directed towards them.
Dirt collection chamber is placed inside the body of the robot. Hence emptying it will
become an issue.

DESIGN 2:
To overcome with the flaws in design 1, we came up with the vaccuming mechanism which
is practically used in market vaccum robots.

A closed chamber ( bottle shaped) is taken. The bottle chamber has a propeller inside it and
holes driven at the back end. The bottle is connected to a vent which will suck in air.

As the propeller rotates it pulls in the air from the chamber and expels it out from the holes
created at the back end. Thus a low pressure area is produced inside the bottle chamber
whereas a high pressure area is created outside it.

This creates a sucking mechanism through the vent connected at the front end of the bottle
chamber. To enhance the suction a perforated film ( tissue paper ). Also it is used for
separating the chamber in two parts.
 Thus , for incorporating the above vaccuming mechanism into the robot, it
was to be placed onto the body of the robot.
Hence , the body of the robot would contain two parts:
THE UPPER PART: It would be a rectangular plate with rounded edges upon which
the vaccum bottle would be placed .
THE LOWER PART: It would mount the wheels, the motors required for it and other
electronic components required.
Top view of THE UPPER PART and THE LOWER PART

Side view of the THE UPPER PART and THE LOWER PART

ELECTRONICS ASPECTS:

The Arduino board (Arduino mega ) will get powered from a 12V rechargeable
source.
Four wheels attached to the LOWER PART are connected to a 100 rpm dc brushless
motors each.
Each of these motors are connected to two motor drivers which in turn are
connected to the Arduino board.
An ultrasonic sensor is mounted on a servo motor which is mounted on the UPPER
PART.
 PROGRAMING ASPECTS:
A program was to be such made so that:
1) The ultrasonic sensor will detect an obstacle, the robot will stop.
2) The servo motors will swing, the ultrasonic sensor (mounted on it) will check the
direction in which there is no obstacle.
3) The desired direction will be relayed to the Arduino .
4) The Arduino board will give signals to the motor drivers which in turn will give
signals to the motors .

MATERIAL AND COMPONENTS USED

UPPER PART (3d print) 34 cm x 13 cm x 0.7 cm

LOWER PART (3d print) 34 cm x 13 cm x 0.7 cm

VACCUM VENT (3d print) h= 15 cm , r = 11 mm, angle of bend = degrees

PLASTIC BOTTLE HOLDING PART Cardboard**

PLASTIC BOTTLE h = 25 cm , r= 7 cm

SPACERS h = 7 cm

MOTORS ( 4 NOS ) 100 RPM DC Brushless (For wheels)

MOTOR ( 1 NO) 100 RPM DC Brushless (For vaccum propeller)

MOTOR DRIVERS 2 No.

ARDUINO Mega 1 No.

WHEELS dia = 33mm

CONNECTING WIRES As required

** The plastic bottle holding part is not 3d printed because it was not possible to take exact
dimension of the bottle and replicate it onto the holder CAD file.
FUTURE PROSPECTS OF THE PROJECT

1) Instead of making individual 3d printing parts and assembling it together, one

complete 3d printed chassis can be made which can hold all the components,
Such a chassis can optimise the weight of the robot.

2) The vaccum vent is made by approximations and thumb rules without any
calculations.
Hence , the angle of the bend and the length of the bend can be calculated by fluid
mechanics equations.

3) The propeller blade can be optimised for getting the perfect vacuuming power.

References:

https://people.ece.cornell.edu/land/courses/ece4760/FinalProjects/s2006/hac24/index.htm

https://web.stevens.edu/ses/me/fileadmin/me/senior_design/2007/group01/DesignFinal.pdf

https://portfolio.id.utwente.nl/student/westenbroekj/verslagen/Verslag.pdf