What have been done at the early stage of FYP1
At the early stage of my FYP , my supervisor which is Associate Professor Dr Mohd Junaidi Bin Abdul Aziz suggested me a title for my FYP project. The project was about an electric skateboard that using a brushed DC motor and Arduino microcontroller as the controller. This skateboard was controlled by using RF controller and has been done by a previous student. My supervisor advised me to improve the skateboard by installing galvanic isolation circuit to protect the MOSFET from short circuit and I also need to change the RF controller because of inefficiency which is too large and difficult to carry around with the skateboard. I have done several research on this topic by reading some materials from Google Scholar. My research included DC motor drive, MOSFET drive circuit, DC-DC converter and pulse width modulation. I also made some research for my project materials in the library from the previous students regarding my related topic.
Addressed problems, things to improve and goals of your project
The problems about this project is, it does not have current limiter circuit to limit the current flow in the MOSFET. In effect, this MOSFET will burn and short circuit so it will no longer operated normally. To improve the circuit, i need to install new galvanic isolation circuit in the gate drive to protect the MOSFET from overcurrent.
The goals for this project is able to install the current limiter into the gate drive circuit while helping the skateboard to be operate normally without any fault. Furthermore, this project also aims to change the old RF controller into another type which is smaller in size and easy to carry.
Possible device or technology applied to solve the problem
This project used IRFZ44N MOSFET as the switching device. The gate driver will be design including with the optocoupler as current limiter in the circuit. Besides, 24 volt brushed DC motor used as the medium to rotate the skateboard tyre and act as propeller. The gate drive circuit will be printed on printed circuit board (PCB). As for the microcontroller, I used Arduino Mega to provide the pulse width modulation signal to the drive and digital oscilloscope will be use to observe the wave signal of the circuit. 12 volt lead-acid battery will be use for the supply and it needs 2 set of 12 volt battery to provide 24V supply as the DC motor voltage rating is 24V. In addition, as to control the skateboard, i decided to use new RF controller which is small and suitable to be use with the skateboard.