A very fast line following wheeled machine to imitate aircraft landing systems

Abstract

The project is about an imitation of an aircraft. landing system which is very useful in bad weather conditions especially fog. The aim of this project is to create a very stable and rehab le system which is mounted on wheels and has to follow light to simulate an aircraft landing in bad weather conditions According to the intensify of light impinging Oil the wheeled device the motor either pulls up or lowers the 'aircraft' in order to follow a path and touch the ground at the desired place. Only a simulation in the vertical plane was achieved. The modulation for the two side lobes was not tackled. During the implementation of the project the following steps were carried out: • Literature Review of current ILS (Instrument Landing System) technologies and also how aircraft landing was facilitated in the past. • Construction of an electronic circuit, prediction of its behavior and testing . The Electronic circuit basically consists of two LDR's which are used lo compare light intensities. Differences in light intensities introduce an error which is amplified and fed to the motor. Control system analyzed using BBC BASIC Actual model was built and tested and several measures were taken to improve the system When using the BBC BASIC to obtain the system's response all waveforms obtained made sense. When building PD controller with no load connected a stable system was obtained. As the motor was loaded an error was introduced and to eliminate the error an integral term has to be introduced such that system remains stable with no error. An observer was later on added so that it can model the real system. While testing the model, the platform moved along the rod following the light indicating that the circuit was working correctly. Varying the position of the torch light, it could be seen clearly that as the torch light was far away with minimal light falling on the LDR's, the platform was moving slowly towards the light but it gained speed as the torch light was brought closer to the platform. Also, changing the direction of light instantly, the system responded efficiently as the direction in which the platform was heading changed abruptly and smoothly.