No more worrying about finding somebody to pluck the coconuts. A robot will do it for you. Students from Amrita School of Engineering have come up with their ‘Robotic coconut tree climber’ which can help any layman pluck the coconuts with ‘robotic help’.
Exhibited at ‘TechTop 2010’- an exhibition of innovative projects from young engineering graduates - robotic coconut tree climber is one among the 19 projects that made it to the last round of the fifth edition of TechTop organised at Technopark here.
Developed by Hareesh S, Akash P, Navneeth K and Vivek Vijayan under the guidance of Rajesh Kannan M, the robot can climb coconut trees and pluck coconuts as directed by the user.
“The robot can be easily used by men or women, from ground using a joy-stick remote” says Navneeth, the seventh semester B Tech student who worked on the project. The robot has two parts, one to climb the tree and the other to pluck the coconut. The user has to wrap the belts of the robot with the tree. “The climbing mechanism is completely automated. Once the robot reaches the top, the user can identify the coconuts to be plucked on the screen, as seen by the camera eye of the robot”, says Vivek, who was a part of the team. The coconut plucking arm of the robot will move in the direction of the movement of the joy stick, he says.
“We are exploring possibilities of sending the camera image to user through Bluetooth technology, so the equipment become wireless”, says Hareesh and Akash. Moreover, if the user has a Bluetooth-enabled mobile phone, the screen can be avoided, reducing the cost of production of the machine, say the students.
Despite their busy exam schedules, these Electronics & Communication students took around three months to develop the robot. Their innovation has already got recognition at national level, when they bagged the first prize in the Humanitarian Technology Conference through a poster presentation last February. It was this prize money, along with inputs from the college management and friends, that gave the financial backbone for realizing the project.
Innovative technologies like gesture-based wheelchair for paralyzed patients, automated seed sowing machine, inexpensive defluoridation of drinking water, remotely-controlled wall climbing robot, footwear sanitizer, seismic measuring device - all compete to get the Degree C award of one lakh rupees here.
Inaugurating the event, NABARD Chief General Manager KC Shridhar said NABARD is looking at sponsoring the best innovative projects from Techtop 2010. Mervin Alexander, CEO, Technopark, VK Damodaran, Director General - INGCORE, Balagopal, Terumo Penpol MD, Chandramouli Rao, Intel India, V Raghuram, NRDC Regional Manager, NT Nair, Executive Knowledge Lines, Moosa C Kandy, Coordinator, TechTop and Rajesh M Nair, CTO Degree Controls, were present.
The prizes for the best projects will be given by Chief Secretary P Prabhakaran at an awards ceremony to be held on Saturday.