So I have been assigned to a group this summer to work on a team project that involves using an Arduino Uno board to "collect, store, and transmit in-field sensor and GPS locator data". So an idea we thought of was to use a ground robot to detect different types of gases with the idea being that it can be used to detect gas leakages.
So here are some questions I would like to ask this community:
First of all, our main concern is getting data from this project. We are aware that testing for gases could be dangerous and could be hard to do. Are there any suggestions as to how we could test and gather data for our project or maybe an alternative safer options we could use our robot to detect.
Next, would this be a doable project in two months for a group of beginners? As for my group, I have more experience with Arduino and coding than the other members so I would hate to deprive my group of learning anything if I'm mostly doing the work.
Any feedback is appreciated, we are also open to any ideas.
What terrain must the robot cross? Will it have to avoid obstacles while navigating a search pattern? That's a lot to chew.
What kind of gas are you looking to detect? Nerve gas? A chemical leak from a specific place? Sulfur dioxide in a volcanic vent?
If there is gas in the air, it will absorb light at certain frequencies, compare the absorption lines to a stored clean air pattern.
Then all you need to move are light sources in view of the collector. Know how to make a cheap spectrometer? Can you read narrow bands of that spectrum?
Someone has done this on a gross 3-band scale to detect substances in water in clear bottles. He just records levels and compares profiles which is a bit analog just on light levels for me. He uses colored-bulb red, green and blue leds for illuminating and detecting light level. The bulb filters the color, read is not affected by other light. But it only gets 3 bands.
Absorption lines.. leds have their own lines that can be referenced by position and width, you can be far more certain of what you get. You can get IR and UV leds, UV might make some gases glow.
The challenge is being able to detect narrow segments of that spectrum. A line of detectors would be poor.
Ask a physics or chemistry prof if you need details. There's probably at least 1 reference with absorption spectra per many known gases.
While I have my doubts about this idea of an absorption line spectrometer then this would help.
They also do an IR one.
Conventional gas detectors do not work very well, they need calibrating, and the heater takes a lot of current. The heater has to be on for at least 48 hours before they stabilise.
Put 2 parallel mirrors with the known led-white light set to reflect a large number of times sawtoothing between 2 mirrors, across both and crossing a lot of distance through whatever's in the air....
Average_Joe:
Next, would this be a doable project in two months for a group of beginners? As for my group, I have more experience with Arduino and coding than the other members so I would hate to deprive my group of learning anything if I'm mostly doing the work.
You have not given a clear indication of how much of the project you have to in the 2 months, or how many hours per day are available to work on it.
If (for example) you have a ready-made working R/C robot and you just want to stick an Arduino onto it that collects data then, with hard work and long hours, I reckon the 2 months is reasonable.
If you also have to build and program the robot than IMHO 2 months is completely impractical.
If you have a working robot but you are required to program it to traverse a pattern autonomously while collecting samples then I also think 2 months is unrealistic.
As an alternative to detecting gases, what about detecting moisture levels in the grass or soil across for example a golf course or a large lawn.