Motion Detecting Robot Help

Jared5755

I thought I'd throw this question out here.

I'm building a mobile robot that is supposed to be a security robot. I want to have motion (people) detecting capability on board while the robot is moving itself. Obviously, the problem is that the robot will be in motion. I've thought about taking measurements with the Ping and calculating what the difference in distance to an object is based on the speed of the robot, but that seems too problematic.

Can anyone think of a creative way around this? Or do I have to stop the robot before it looks for motion?

I know it's probably an absurd request, but thanks for helping.

Jared

Mike Green

You put the sensor on a platform that can be moved independently and reverse compensate for the robot's movement. For example, you get the PING servo bracket. When the robot moves to the right, you turn the bracket to the left the same amount so it's still pointing in the same direction regardless of the robot's movement just like you turn your head to track an object even though you're turning in some other direction. You can mount a compass on the same bracket if you want so there's an absolute reference or you can just use the servo's position as an estimate of the direction of the sensor position relative to the robot's estimated orientation.

Jared5755

That's a good idea. I might just try that. Thanks for the idea.

Jared