For his project entered in the Hackaday Prize, [Neil] is working on a navigation aid for the blind. He’s calling his device Pathfinder, and it’s designed to allow greater freedom of motion for the disabled.
Pathfinder is a relatively simple device, with a cheap, off the shelf ultrasonic distance sensor, an ATMega, and a few passives. On its own, the ultrasonic distance sensor is only accurate to about 5%. By incorporating a temperature sensor, [Neil] was able to nail down the accuracy of his sensor to about 1%. Impressive!
For the machine to human interface, [Neil] chose haptic feedback, or small vibration motors tucked away inside a wristband. It’s by far the easiest way to add the output needed, and with a haptic motor driver, it’s easy to add specialized drive patterns to the vibration motor
You can check out [Neil]’s quarterfinal entry video for the Pathfinder below.
Filed under: The Hackaday Prize
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