Balancing monowheel using electric ducted fans : A study on designing and programming a monowheeled robot

Abstract: Technology advances each day, with every advancement new and improved products are accompanied. Robots come in various shapes and sizes, from the size of a fly to the size of a human being. The purpose of this project is to further our understanding in how to build a robot, more specifically, a mono wheeled robot and design control systems enabling it to balance by itself. The robot is a one-wheeler with ducted fans on top. It is to balance with the help of the wheel in one direction and with ducted fans in the perpendicular direction.The robot succeeded in balancing with the wheel. However with help of the fans the robot only managed to balance for approximately 20 seconds. Analysing the frequency content from figures 5.2, 5.4, 5.3 resulted in finding frequencies under 1Hz being dominant in the output signals from the control system, observing this a clear oscillation frequency was only determined for the ducted fan system while the wheel system was non periodic. The study concluded that one cannot stabilize the control systems individually because that can lead to disturbances for the other. The results showed that even though the wheel’s control system was stable, it was affected by the second control system, causing disturbances.