This might just save us

What we have here is a DROK L298N Dual H-Bridge Robot Stepper Motor Control & Drives Module. In any type of moving “object, you want to be able to give it power when you want. What you don’t want is only two settings: full power or no power. What this device allows us to do is alternate between those two options without interruption. This the case with our project once the circuit is close, power is constantly being given unless we sever the connection. We mentioned in older posts that we attempted to use the older control module, but since it was so old we couldn’t see to get it to work. We went ahead and purchased this and surprisingly it was fairly cheap. This will benefit us when we integrate it with our Arduino board and joystick allowing us to stay connected and (hopefully) move the wheel chair on command. 

It's...ALIVE!

So we finally made some real progress! As you can see in this video posted below, we managed to give the motor power and at least move the wheels. Judging from how slow it turns though, we will need more power in order for it to move a person, let alone itself.

Forward and Back

 We found this joystick online and it seems to be easily integrated into our system. As of right now, we would just like the wheel chair to be able to at least move forward and backwards. Turning side to side will be a much more challenging task. Also, we would like to be able to 3-D print a part to allow the joystick to stay stationary and to protect it a way. We will design a box that can hold it in place that is safe and easily accessible.

Almost there

This is a back view of the wheel chair and more or less the entire project. The only thing that is missing is the chair itself (which is somewhere in the background) and the joystick that should be implemented soon.

An idea set in stone

So we have been busy at work on this project. We have managed to get together a couple times and boil everything done to what we are using for parts. We also have plenty of pictures.

This is a power source we hope to use. It came out of an old car that was not in use anymore. We hope that it can still hold somewhat of a charge.

We found 2 tires that came off an old bicycle. 

Caster wheels for the front of wheel chair

These movable bearings were purchased from a hardware store.

The motor that we ripped out of the poor treadmill. The pulleys you see on the left were also bought from a store. It took a long time to find a small pulley that would give us decent torque. That was the smallest we could find without spending too much money

This is just an overview of the gutted treadmill. We took a lot out of it

The top picture is the internal power supply that came with the tread mill. The picture right below it was the motor control unit. Because this treadmill is so old, we don't know if we can use this at all, but we can try.

Here is just a mess of everything else that we have been working on. All of the wires and soldering that have been going behind the scenes of the project. 

So here is what we have so far. As you can see in some of the pictures, the frame itself has already been built. Regarding the axle in some of the pictures, one of our group member's, Dean, machined the axle himself and had it threaded. This allowed us to lock the tires in and help give it a stable ride when we do some actual testing.

Some parts...

So after looking at what we really wanted to do, we went ahead and are going to attempt to make a electric wheel chair. This project will of course incorporate the skills we have learned in lab like Solidworks and Arduino. So far for the project, we somewhat have a list of what we want to be apart of the project.

The unfinished list includes:

• We would like tires or wheels of some sort. So far we might be going with bicycle tires and regular caster wheels. As of right now, we are not too sure about where to position them. 
• A base or frame. Probably going to be using plywood in this case because it's cheap and strong enough to hold a good amount of weight.
• An axle
• To drive the wheels, we looked at different types of motors. We thought about using a gasoline motor at first, but then found out it would be rather difficult to wire it in with an Arduino. We ended up just going with a motor taken out from an old treadmill.
• A Power supply. Possibly using a car battery or some other source of power
• A lot of wiring
• Some type of control module
• A device that can control the movement of the wheel chair (Joystick or steering wheel of some sort) 

This is a very rough list of what we want to do, but hopefully we should have a much better list and some pictures to show for progress in the coming blog posts.