No abstract

The difficulty to communicate effectively during unforeseen circumstances has very often lead to serious problems where the safety of the population has been at risk. The problems may be due to the simple fact that the person wishing to send a message does not have the contact details of the person/s at the other end. Although extensive communication network exists in most countries, there are situations where people do not get the required message in time. This report deals with the design of an autonomous/remote messenger (robot) that can receive and send messages using the GSM network. The robot can be used at any time to inform the target group of any mishaps. An authorized person simply has to send the appropriate codes via the Short Message Service (SMS) to the robot. When the robot receives the SMS, it will decipher the message and convey the message to the persons at a desired location. The message is displayed on a propeller LED with a 360 0 viewing angle located on the robot. The system is not designed to enter inside individual rooms but a wireless communications system allows the robot to send a message inside the room to call for the attention of the persons inside the room. The major challenge was to design the propeller display as it uses the persistence of vision to clearly display the message. The autonomous messenger also includes a remote control for manual navigation of robot, ultrasonic sensors for obstacle detection, battery level indicators on the display and the robot, interlocks and an emergency switch among others. Sustainability has been an important issue while manufacturing the system and as far as possible components from waste has been used without affecting the performance of the system. Variants of the proposed system can be produced depending on customer requirements e.g. display can be attached to the ceiling or wall and display messages as requested by SMS.