Open Ended Design Project - Open Ended Design Project Ryan...

Open Ended Design Project
Ryan Ott
901427
Brian Clarke

Abstract:
The purpose of this project is to use the information found in a piezoelectric force
sensor lab to design a system that can be used in the detection of illegal immigrants or
terrorists that are trying to smuggle into the United States via trucks.
Introduction:
The US Border Patrol has asked us to develop a low-cost sensor system that
detects potential illegal immigrants or terrorists that may be trying to smuggle themselves
into the US by hiding in container trucks crossing the border. We will perform a small
scale experiment, using piezoelectric force sensors, to find that the high pass
characteristics of a load cell will remove the “dead weight” of the truck and its cargo.
This will detect the very small forces due to the presence of human activity. These forces
will be amplified using a charge amplifier. Any truck that contains these small
movement forces, should be considered suspect and dealt with accordingly.
Proposed Design:
Our design consists of a PCB Piezotronics Model 218C load cell connected to a
Kistler Model 5004 charge amplifier, which is then connected to an oscilloscope and a
computer as shown in Fig. 1. The procedure for all trucks to be checked is as follows.
First, the truck driver must pull his truck onto the platform that contains the PCB
Piezotronics load cell. The driver must turn off the truck and exit the truck and platform,
so his movements or the movements of a running vehicle will not be picked up by the
system. The truck may take time to reach a steady state (everything has come to a rest),
so time must be allotted for such a “cool down period”. Next, the computer, equipped
with an AquireNScan2File.vi virtual instrument, will take a graphical reading of the
weight of the truck and its cargo.