Project

# Title Team Members TA Documents Sponsor
18 S-band Radar Altimeter
 Bobby Sommers
Elliot Rubin
Rayan Nehme
 Koushik Udayachandran design_document1.pdf
final_paper1.pdf
photo1.png
presentation1.pdf
proposal1.pdf
proposal2.pdf
video
Problem:
Currently, hobbyist RC aircraft and civil drones rely on GPS and barometers for altitude measurements. While these methods are reliable and accurate, they may not tell the operator the full story. GPS is a line of sight system and does not work when the receiver is obscured by terrain or buildings. Barometers read air pressure, but will not measure the distance between an aircraft and terrain. A radar altimeter would provide low-flying drones and RC aircraft with accurate altitude measurements relative to terrain.

Solution Overview:
Our solution relies on a FMCW (frequency modulated continuous wave) S-band radar altimeter powered off of an internal battery. The radar altimeter will be mounted to the bottom of the drone and will use the 2.4GHz ISM band in its operation.

Solution Components:

Processing Unit:
The processing unit will consist of a microcontroller, barometric altimeter, and an SD card slot. The microcontroller will calculate the range to terrain based on the doppler shift from the radar and will log this information to the SD card. It will also record the altitude measured via the barometric altimeter to compare with the radar measurement. Finally, the microcontroller will generate the control signal for the FMCW waveform.

Radar Unit:
The radar unit will consist of two submodules: the transmitter and the receiver.

The transmitter performs frequency modulation using a VCO (voltage controlled oscillator) with a tune voltage generated by the microcontroller. This tune voltage is used to sweep the VCO frequency and creates an FM waveform. A PA (power amplifier) is used to increase the transmit power and is connected to the Tx patch antenna. The Rx patch array receives the reflected signal, amplifies it through a LNA (low noise amplifier), down converts it with a mixer, and provides the demodulated signal to the processing unit.

Power Unit:
The power unit consists of a shielded switching converter to provide DC supply voltage to the other units. This DC power will be regulated by a LDO (low dropout regulator) to provide low-noise power to sensitive components such as the LNA and the VCO.

Criterion for Success:
Our radar altimeter should accurately and precisely measure distance within 1m and record measurement data to a SD card for post processing. It should have a minimum range of 20 m.

Alternatives:
There are several 24GHz radar altimeters designed for use on UAVs, but they are more expensive and are not targeted to consumers. Development boards from semiconductor companies and vendors such as Adafruit and Seed also operate in the 24GHz band, but have very limited range (<10 m).

Logic Circuit Teaching Board

Younas Abdul Salam, Andrzej Borzecki, David Lee

Featured Project

Partners: Younas Abdul Salam, Andrzej Borzecki, David Lee

The proposal our group has is of creating a board that will be able to teach students about logic circuits hands on. The project will consist of a board and different pieces that represent gates. The board will be used to plug in the pieces and provide power to the internal circuitry of the pieces. The pieces will have a gate and LEDs inside, which will be used to represent the logic at the different terminals.

By plugging in and combining gates, students will be able to see the actual effect on logic from the different combinations that they make. To add to it, we will add a truth table that can be used to represent inputs and outputs required, for example, for a class project or challenge. The board will be able to read the truth table and determine whether the logic the student has created is correct.

This board can act as a great learning source for students to understand the working of logic circuits. It can be helpful in teaching logic design to students in high schools who are interested in pursuing a degree in Electrical Engineering.

Please comment on whether the project is good enough to be approved, and if there are any suggestions.

Thank you