Project

# Title Team Members TA Documents Sponsor
9 Portable RF Light Socket Control
 Andrew Strauss
Grant Bonnstetter
Michael Kopera
 Dongwei Shi design_document0.pdf
final_paper0.pdf
photo0.jpg
presentation0.pptx
proposal0.pdf
video
Michael Kopera - mkopera2
Andrew Strauss - aistrau2
Grant Bonnstetter - bonnste2


-Problem Statement

Light switches at times can be located in highly inconvenient places. A portable light switch gives users freedom and customization for light switch placement.


-Design

The solution contains two main components. The first is the portable light switch and the second is an attachment that goes between the light bulb and the light socket. The light switch would be battery powered and have an RF transceiver. The intermediate device between the light bulb and socket includes a RF receiver module as well as Solid State Relay (SSR) that would act as a switch between the socket and bulb. The intermediate device would also be powered by the light socket through a 120 VAC to 5 VDC converter. The 5 VDC would go to powering the receiver, logic circuitry, and the SSR. The 120VAC circuity would have a fuse to protect all the other components in the intermediate device.

If multiple lights need to be controlled, the light switch could have an additional component that would allow the user to select a frequency range. Different frequencies would control a single light or a set of lights. The light socket intermediate device would have the capability to tune to different frequency channels.

Transmission will based in the 433 MHz band which is allocated for short range communication in the home automation area devices. One opportunity we see to make our solution distinct from existing solutions is to extend the range of communication by repeating the transmitted signal across the sockets distributed across a home.


-Further Motivations

Current designs for light control systems involve the use of wifi, bluetooth, and smartphones. Having lighting linked to a smartphone restricts the user and their guests from easily doing a simple task like turning on the lights. Solutions requiring smartphones restrict the user in a way because the user has to download particular apps as well as their guests if they want to access the lights. Whereas our solution is a portable light switch that can be placed anywhere and used by anyone.

Assistive Chessboard

Robert Kaufman, Rushi Patel, William Sun

Assistive Chessboard

Featured Project

Problem: It can be difficult for a new player to learn chess, especially if they have no one to play with. They would have to resort to online guides which can be distracting when playing with a real board. If they have no one to play with, they would again have to resort to online games which just don't have the same feel as real boards.

Proposal: We plan to create an assistive chess board. The board will have the following features:

-The board will be able to suggest a move by lighting up the square of the move-to space and square under the piece to move.

-The board will light up valid moves when a piece is picked up and flash the placed square if it is invalid.

-We will include a chess clock for timed play with stop buttons for players to signal the end of their turn.

-The player(s) will be able to select different standard time set-ups and preferences for the help displayed by the board.

Implementation Details: The board lights will be an RGB LED under each square of the board. Each chess piece will have a magnetic base which can be detected by a magnetic field sensor under each square. Each piece will have a different strength magnet inside it to ID which piece is what (ie. 6 different magnet sizes for the 6 different types of pieces). Black and white pieces will be distinguished by the polarity of the magnets. The strength and polarity will be read by the same magnetic field sensor under each square. The lights will have different colors for the different piece that it is representing as well as for different signals (ie. An invalid move will flash red).

The chess clock will consist of a 7-segment display in the form of (h:mm:ss) and there will be 2 stop buttons, one for each side, to signal when a player’s turn is over. A third button will be featured near the clock to act as a reset button. The combination of the two stop switches and reset button will be used to select the time mode for the clock. Each side of the board will also have a two toggle-able buttons or switches to control whether move help or suggested moves should be enabled on that side of the board. The state of the decision will be shown by a lit or unlit LED light near the relevant switch.

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