Automatic Bicycle

Sat, 09 May 2015 00:00:00 +0000

The Mechatronics class at South Dakota School of Mines & Technology has students form groups for a maze solving robot and free projects. My group decided to make an automatically shifting bicycle for our free project. We set up the bicycle to monitor the current speed and change the current gear in order to get the maximum workout.

Finding the speed

The bicycle tracked speeds at two locations on the bike. The first was the wheel speed. This let us know that the bike was actually moving and making progress. The second location was at the crank. This let us know when the rider might be coasting or if they are doing a lot of leg work without making much movement progress.

Gesture Control Mouse Input

Fri, 09 May 2014 00:00:00 +0000

The project for my Sophomore Design class at South Dakota School of Mines & Technology. For our semester long project, my group decided to make a wearable device that could translate hand gestures into mouse input for a computer. We nicknamed the device “The BAND” as an acronym of the involved members first names.

Reading Hand Gestures

To read the user’s hand position, we used an electromyography (EMG) sensor attached to the forearm with silver coated fabric and conductive gel. Whenever a muscle flexes in the human body it releases a very small amount of voltage.

AVR on

Automatic Bicycle

Finding the speed

Gesture Control Mouse Input

Reading Hand Gestures