Hey,
i'm a postgrad student for electrical engineering and i have to complete a thesis for my last semester. I can't seem to come up with anything...
I wanted to do something microcontroller based but my mind is blank. Any ideas or suggestions are welcome.
thanks

 

Using strain gauges attached to a tree, to measure its bending moment in
wind, to create a wind speed instrument. Or measure health of tree wood.
Or sap / sugar content in remote portion of tree, like tree top.

Create an embedded UP instrument immune to single event ionization in
internal memory, logic. Non stop computing basically.

Detection / robotic system to remove plastic waste from oceans. Same for space junk.

Projects that extract energy from environment to power instruments and IOT. Energy harvesting.

Regards, Dana.

 

Here are some ideas I have been hiding for awhile:
1) Robot ping pong player (https://www.electronicproducts.com/Videos/This_madly_skilled_robot_will_cream_you_at_ping_pong.aspx)
2) Invisible car

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The ping pong player is neat, but the invisible car offers opportunities that only my evil twin could envision. Rather than make your entire car invisible, which might be dangerous in traffic. Make your front end look like the car behind you. Think of the possibilities. You go speeding and the car behind you gets the ticket!

 

Here are some ideas:
You could go with a classic, the Tesla coil. That is a good way to demonstrate knowledge of many electrical principals.

You could make an inverter to create mains voltage (just be careful).

You could make a welder, maybe a really powerful one. This would also allow you to do more advanced robotics in the future.

You could make a watch that gradually electrocutes you more to wake you up. From almost nothing to 10s of mAs.

You could automate things and possibly have voice control. Maybe make doors with motors to open them, automate facets, etc. This could be advertised as making things more accessible for the elderly, etc.

Turn everyday objects into electric things. Glasses that change color based on fullness, arc lighter gloves, whatever.

Modify an existing device to add functionality. Maybe allow much faster charging for a phone with similar cables, using high/higher voltage and different batteries.

These are just a few ideas. Obviously what you can do is limited by materials, cost, and workspace.

 

Construct a large air gap condenser. Make the plates round and independently rotatable. Plates must remain parallel. Charge condenser with HV AC voltage. Monitor current. Spin one plate. Spin it as quick as you can. 6k RPM if possible. The higher the better. Grab a ME to help you.

Did current change with rotation? Try 10k RPM and higher if possible. Consider air pressure drive.

Was there any torque on stationary plate? Increase voltage if possible.

Now spin stationary plate in opposite direction(try same direction too) at same RPM. Any change in current?

Are you curious? Reduce one plate or increase one plate, 10 times in area. Repeat. And after that........try different frequencies.

Find a geeky ME and do something different.


Edit: The object is to detect and hopefully observe a new term to the capacitance equation. Can the capacitance and/or the bandpass be effected with relative plate rotation? And if so...how and which rotation?

 

Sorry for the late late response.. I really like the ping pong player idea as I am interested in computer vision.
thanks guys