Myostat CoolMuscle Motors Are Here!

GREAT NEWS! We received our Myostat CoolMuscle Motors a few days ago and boy are we excited! These motors were donated by Myostat Motion Control, Inc. and will be responsible for the lateral motion of the foosmen across the table. Here is how they came in the box from Myostat Motion Control:

All of the motors have a male and a female RS-232 connection port. This port will be used to communicate the position of the ball from the ARM processor. An up-close image of the 9-pin D-SUB connectors are pictured below.

The theory of operation for these motors is as follows: Once the processor has determined the position of the ball from the sensor array along the parameter of the table, the processor will send this position to the "master" motor via RS-232. The master motor then relays that position to the "slaves". The other end of the motor is what will be responsible for moving the foosmen. On that end of the motor is the shaft, pictured below:

This shaft will be connected to the slides donated by Macron Dynamics (which we have yet to receive). On top of each slide will sit a smaller motor responsible for kicking the ball. As the Myostat motors move the slides back and forth to position the foosmen in the desired location, the "kicking" motors also move, as they are directly coupled to the rods moving the foosmen. We should have our slides from Macron Dynamics within a week. I'll post an article with video link to the functioning motor set in case my explanation for the theory of operation is unclear.

In other news, we just finished setting up one side of the sensor grid and connected the IR LEDs and phototransistors to the sensing boards to locate the position of the ball. I will post photos of that sensor arrangement for clarity of the concept. Stay tuned for updates and don't forget to like us on Facebook so you don't miss any of the action as we progress toward a completed Foosbot!

Sensing PCB Design and Scheme explanation.

Pictured above is one (1) of twelve (12) PCB's furnished with our sensing scheme (comparators, resistors, a multiplexer, and a demultiplexer). These twelve boards will be connected together and used to detect the position of the ball as follows:

The LED's are pulsed in groups along the edge of the table. Corresponding to each LED is a phototransistor that sits across the table. When the LED is energized, the voltage across the phototransistor circuit changes. If the ball is to interrupt the infrared light going across the table, the voltage across the phototransistor circuit drops. This voltage (across the pull-down resistors in the phototransistor circuit) is compared with a reference voltage used in the comparator. The signals from all of the phototransistors are multiplexed and sent to the processor (BeagleBone Rev. A3), which demultiplexes said signals and locates the position of the ball based on the address of the phototransistor that detected the ball.

This process is repeated for sixteen (16) groups of phototransistor and LED pairs along the edges of the table to locate the position of the ball at a power-efficient and extremely fast rate. Once the position of the ball is found multiple times, a trajectory can be calculated and the position of the foosmen can be adjusted according to the future position of the ball.

Stay tuned for more updates related to the operation of the ARM processor on the BeagleBone development board as well as how motors will be used to position the foosmen and kick the ball!

-Khalil
Project Leader, Team Foosbot

Who is Team Foosbot and what are they building?

Need:
The game of foosball has entered the homes of people all over the world since it was first invented in 1922 to replicate the game of soccer.  The game was patented in the UK in 1923 and in the US in 1927 and remains as one of the oldest table games still played today, falling only to billiards and table tennis.  Today, five annual World Championship Series events are hosted by the International Table Soccer Federation (ITSF) which culminates in an annual World Cup where the best players from over 40 countries compete for world titles.  Even with the popularity of foosball, many tables remain highly unused, serving more as decorations than entertainment devices.  The automated foosball table would integrate modern technology with a classic game to provide entertainment to foosball table owners everywhere.


Team Objective:
The objective of this project is to design and build an automated foosball table machine which will serve as an opponent to a human player.  Besides providing the thrill of challenging a robot to a game of foosball, this also allow players to practice their skills when a human opponent is unavailable. The system will also keep score of the game for ease of play.  By doing so, the automated foosball table will provide an entertaining opponent for any game of foosball. Building this project on a senior-design team at the University of Akron will serve as the independent design requirement for the ABET accreditation.


Research Survey:

The concept of an automated foosball table has been explored by several groups, such as those from the University of Adelaide, the University of Sherbrooke, and the University of Waterloo.  Each design consists of different ways of detecting the position of the ball, moving the foosmen, and determining where to move the foosmen for game play resembling a human’s.  The program to control foosmen movement can be implemented on either a microprocessor or laptop computer.  This will need to communicate with the motors which need to be high-speed in order to accommodate real-time game play. 

Perhaps the most difficult aspect of the project is detecting the position of the foosball.  Several groups have used various types of cameras (high-speed, pin-hole) to track the ball.  These designs are very complex and extremely expensive. Team Foosbot thought of a much simpler and cost-effective approach to achieving the same thing. The idea is to use infrared light emitting diodes (IR LEDs) and optical detectors (phototransistors) so that the ball breaks the light from the LED.  This option allows for a very fast response, although the accuracy is limited since the LED’s must be placed far enough apart to prevent illuminating multiple photodetectors.

No patents for automated foosball tables were found. The only design found that resembles this tracking ability is a YouTube video that shows the reaction of the foosmen in response to the LED (visible light spectrum) tracking.

Updates:

Updates will be made on this blog as well as the following outlets:

Facebook group page (TeamFoosbot)

YouTube Channel: TeamFoosbot

Google+: TeamFoosbot

Twitter: TeamFoosbot

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More posts will be made shortly with updates related to the progress of the project.


-Khalil
Project Lead, Team Foosbot