Design of an electronic odometer for DC motors

Abstract

The paper proposes an innovative electronic sensor for odometry in mobile robotics. The sensor is based on measurement of current peaks caused by commutation of a DC electric motor. The signal is preprocessed by analog filters, then digital processing in microcontroller is applied. The sensor utilizes small low-power MCU AtTiny44 and provides SPI interface for the communication with the master robot controller. The main advantage of the proposed sensor is the lack of any mechanical parts, which results in high durability. The sensor has been simulated in Simulink and then a fully-functional sample was created and tested.