Gyroscope Controlled Robot (Wireless)

Hello everyone! Welcome to another instructable. A couple of days ago I made a Gyroscope controlled robot but the problem with that one was the wires attached to sensor. That made it look messy. And who would like to use a wired connection if wireless ones are available in just few bucks?

So here in this instructable I made a wireless gyroscope controlled robot using the RF ASK transmitter and receiver module. The transmitter part consists of the MPU-6050 gyroscope module and the RF transmitter.

The gyroscope works in the similar fashion as in the wired version. The only change here is that the sensor values will be mapped to a particular character like a, b, c, d, etc. You can change these characters as per your wish.

To understand this properly here is a quick example- Suppose you want your robot to turn left. So for that you will tilt the gyroscope module to the left. Then as it reaches a certain range it will send a character (Let's say 'L') to the receiver.

The receiver has only one job i.e. to receive the character and turn the robot accordingly. Here we received a 'L' So the receiver will turn the robot left.

The motor driver part at the receiver is also similar to that of the wired version.

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2 x Arduino Uno Boards

1 x MPU 6050 Gyroscope sensor(GY-521)

1 x 433 Mhz RF Module

2 x 9V batteries to power both the Arduino Boards

1 x Metal chassis with wheels and motors

1 x Breadboard

1 x Motordriver Module (L293d)

Connecting wires

Additional - General purpose PCB, Soldering iron, 1 x led for indication (optional), Antenna for RF TX (I salvaged mine from an old RC car), male to male and male to female headers.

First let's start by building the receiver. I used a breadboard to build the receiver side. You can also go with soldering the components together on a general purpose PCB. Follow the circuit properly in order to avoid any short circuits. Motors are connected to the L293d Motor Driver module. Then the driver's input is connected to the Arduino's pins. An led is connected to pin 13 in order to indicate if the receiver received the character or not. The receiver is connected to the Arduino Board and finally the battery is connected to the Vin pin and ground of the Arduino.

Now let's get to the transmitter part. I created an Arduino shield for the transmitter part. Creating the shield is easy. First place the male to male headers as per the pin outs of the Arduino Board (shown in the first image) and then solder them on the same side. Once soldered gently push the black stoppers downwards. There your basic PCB for the shield is ready. Now follow the circuit diagram to do the rest of the connections. I soldered a female header pin over a male to male header pin to mount the gyro sensor. (2nd last image) Then soldered the other end of male to male header to the PCB. The reason to do this is to keep the gyro sensor as flat as possible. Now connect the receiver module and the battery. The connections part is done.

Here are the codes for both the Arduino's. Just compile and upload them to the boards and you are good to go. If you want any help regarding the code feel free to comment below. Now connect the batteries and you are good to go. After powering if your project does not work then check if the status led is receiving any data when you tilt the sensor. If it is receiving the data then the problem is with your motor driver. Check the motor driver and arduino's connections again.

If the status led does not blink even after tilting the sensor then the problem either lies with your RF Tx or the Gyroscope module. I faced a similar problem. My gyroscope module was not soldered properly to the board. So I soldered it back properly. If you are in the similar situation then check both the Tx and the Gyroscope module separately on the breadboard and then check them together. You should be able to figure out if your PCB is not accurate or your components are faulty.

I have attached a video above to show the working of the project. You can see in the video above how the robot moves when the Gyroscope sensor is tilted in that direction.

Now enjoy the wireless gyroscope robot. Hope you learned something from this instructable. If yes, then please share it with your friends. Also don't forget to leave a like. That's it for today guys. See you with another awesome project soon. Thank you.