Quadrupled Agricultural Pesticide Spraying Robot

Pests and Weeds are the major threats to diminished production of crops like potato, paddy, wheat and cotton. To control pests and weeds, sprays (pesticides and weedicides) are used. Farmers here use manual methods of spraying the fields without taking protective measures. Their body, skin and respi

Project Title

Quadrupled Agricultural Pesticide Spraying Robot

Project Area of Specialization

Electrical/Electronic Engineering

Project Summary

Pests and Weeds are the major threats to diminished production of crops like potato, paddy, wheat and cotton. To control pests and weeds, sprays (pesticides and weedicides) are used. Farmers here use manual methods of spraying the fields without taking protective measures. Their body, skin and respiratory system are in direct contact with these poisonous and fatal gases. Despite health hazards manually spraying the fields takes a lot of time and effort. Due to unmanaged and unvigilant spraying weeds are seen to grow again even after spraying. This project presents a smart and time efficient method of spraying the crop fields by saving the lives of farmers at an affordable fare. It will cover the entire field by simply operating through a mobile phone application. The farmer can spray in any direction and by any speed. The interface and usage shall be kept as simple as possible, so that non-technical people can operate it hassle-free and can get adapted to it. The robot is designed to encourage the use of modern technology in the agricultural sector of Pakistan and to promote the multiple benefits of a single robot than old methods adopted for spraying the pests and weeds.

Project Objectives

Operation through Mobile Phone

The spraying robot is fully operated by a mobile phone application built on MIT smart app inventor which after connected via Bluetooth can perform the dedicated tasks. We have developed this application with an easy and uncomplicated user interface so that any non-technical person can be able to operate it.

Four-Way Direction

The four way directions of the robot i.e. Forward, Reverse, Left, Right are achieved when these buttons are pressed on the application created on MIT smart app inventor, the button pressed sends signal to Bluetooth module which further directs to the Arduino UNO and associated motors are turned ON due to the program written on it. When forward command is given through the application, the Arduino drives all the motors to move forward. Similarly, when Reverse Command is prompted the motors move backwards to make reverse/backwards movement possible. Left movement of the Robot is achieved by making the Front-Right motor to move forward and Back-Left to move backwards.

360° Spraying Coverage

Whenever spraying command is given to the Arduino spraying of the material is achieved by activating the water pump which carries water from the tank to the spraying nozzles. The servo motors are used to rotate the nozzle mount up/down and left/right providing spraying at all direction or 360° coverage. Initially we have set up only one motor, but we aim to enhance the effectiveness by adding one more nozzle in future.

Robot Speed Adjustment

The speed of the robot can be changed to whatever speed the operator wants it to be operated according to the requirement of the field or according to the surface/ roughness of the terrain. This speed adjuster is too provided on the application so the user can change it anytime he/she wants.

Low spraying material indication

A water level sensor is placed inside water tank to indicate the water level, whenever water level reduces to 10% a buzzer starts beeping informing the user/operator that the spraying material has reached 10% and is about to end. This will enable the user to fill the tank and use the robot again.

Project Implementation Method

We have made an app that connects Bluetooth module (hc-05) with android phone. HC-05 receives the signal from mobile application and then transmits the signal to the Arduino board. The mobile application has following commands: • LEFT/RIGHT/FORWARD/BACKWARD • SPRAY ON/OFF • LEFT/RIGHT/UP/DOWN movement of spray nozzle For QASPR’s movement motors are connected with IBT?2 motor drivers that are high power motor drives which has operating voltage of 3.3V-5V (Output voltage of Arduino). IBT?2 are driving the four motors for its movement. For 12V DC pump, we have connected a single channel relay that operates whenever a high signal is received at its input pin. Moreover, the relay is connected with 12V/7A battery to operate DC pump. Spray nozzle is connected with two servo motors (MG-996R), one for left/right movement and other one for up/down movement.

Benefits of the Project

To mitigate these level-headed and pragmatic problems we aim to develop an automotive system that is cost effective, time efficient , user friendly as well as provides safety and security to the health of the operators i.e. environment friendly. This system will benefit the small scale farmers who are not financially stable enough to buy or rent octacopters and are forced to stick to methods that cause them harm. The built system would be simpler and easy to use keeping in view the non-technical approach of a farmer living in a remote area. In this way not only technology and automation will be introduced into agriculture sector but will also encourage the farmers to adopt more new techniques that can increase or improve the production of certain crops

Technical Details of Final Deliverable

HC-05 Bluetooth module

This high performance, low power bluetooth module i.e.(HC-05) will act as an interface between a mobile application and Arduino, the bluetooth module will receive the signal from mobile application and will provide the signal to arduino for the required operation.

MG-996R Servo Motor

Mg-996R servo motor is a high torque motor and an upgraded version of 995 servo motor, it has type of positional rotation. It rotates 180 degree, there is a stop gear that will make sure that the motor does not over rotate. The servo motor will be used for the up and down movement of the sprayers.

IBT 2 Motor Driver

Motor driver will act as an interface between the motor and the arduino. The driver will take low current at the input and will provide the higher current that will drive the motors (DC gear motor), for the left and right movement of the spraying nozzles.

 DC Gear Motor

At the output DC gear motors will be operated by the motor driver mentioned in the section 3.3 that will either move the sprayer right or left. So, for two nozzles 4 DC gear motors will be used, two for left movement and two for right

Final Deliverable of the Project

Hardware System

Core Industry

Agriculture

Other Industries

Core Technology

Internet of Things (IoT)

Other Technologies

Sustainable Development Goals

Good Health and Well-Being for People, Affordable and Clean Energy, Decent Work and Economic Growth, Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure

Required Resources

If you need this project, please contact me on contact@adikhanofficial.com