Automatic Railway Gate Control System Mini project

 The aim of this project is to Automate unmanned railway gate using mechatronics.

PROJECT DEFINATION:

The objective of this project is to manage the control system of railway gate using the microcontroller. When train arrives at the sensing point alarm is triggered at the railway crossing point so that the people get intimation that gate is going to be closed. Then the control system activates and closes the gate on either side of the track. once the train crosses the other end control system automatically lifts the gate. For mechanical operation of the gates 1.8 step angle stepper motors are employed. Here we are using embedded controller built around the 8051 family (AT89C52) for the control according to the data pattern produced at the input port of the micro controller, the appropriate selected action will be taken.. The logic is produced by the program written in Embedded C language. The software program is written, by using the KEIL micro vision environment. The program written is then converted in HEX code after simulation and burned on to microcontroller using FLASH micro vision.

WORKING METHODOLOGY:

Present project is designed using 8051 microcontroller to avoid railway accidents happening at unattended railway gates, if implemented in spirit. This project utilizes two powerful IR transmitters and two receivers; one pair of transmitter and receiver is fixed at up side (from where the train comes) at a level higher than a human being in exact alignment and similarly the other pair is fixed at down side of the train direction. Sensor activation time is so adjusted by calculating the time taken at a certain speed to cross at least one compartment of standard minimum size of the Indian railway. We have considered 5 seconds for this project. Sensors are fixed at 1km on both sides of the gate. We call the sensor along the train direction as ‘foreside sensor’ and the other as ‘after side sensor’. When foreside receiver gets activated, the gate motor is turned on in one direction and the gate is closed and stays closed until the train crosses the gate and reaches aft side sensors. When aft side receiver gets activated motor turns in opposite direction and gate opens and motor stops. Buzzer will immediately sound at the fore side receiver activation and gate will close after 5 seconds, so giving time to drivers to clear gate area in order to avoid trapping between the gates and stop sound after the train has crossed.



GATE CONTROL

Railways being the cheapest mode of transportation are preferred over all the other means .When we go through the daily newspapers we come across many railway accidents occurring at unmanned railway crossings. This is mainly due to the carelessness in manual operations or lack of workers. We, in this project has come up with a solution for the same. Using simple electronic components we have tried to automate the control of railway gates. As a train approaches the railway crossing from either side, the sensors placed at a certain distance from the gate detects the approaching train and accordingly controls the operation of the gate. Also an indicator light has been provided to alert the motorists about the approaching train.


INTRODUCTION:

The objective of this project is to manage the control system of railway gate using the microcontroller. When train arrives at the sensing point alarm is triggered at the railway crossing point so that the people get intimation that gate is going to be closed. Then the control system activates and closes the gate on either side of the track. once the train crosses the other end control system automatically lifts the gate. For mechanical operation of the gates 1.8 step angle stepper motors are employed. Here we are using embedded controller built around the 8051 family (AT89C52) for the control according to the data pattern produced at the input port of the micro controller, the appropriate selected action will be taken.. The logic is produced by the program written in Embedded C language. The software program is written, by using the KEIL micro vision environment. The program written is then converted in HEX code after simulation and burned on to microcontroller using FLASH micro vision.

AT89C51 Microcontroller:

The Micro controller (AT89C51) is a low power; high performance CMOS 8-bit micro controller with 4K bytes of Flash programmable and erasable read only memory (PEROM). The on-chip Flash allows the program memory to be reprogrammed in-system or by a conventional non-volatile memory programmer. By combining a versatile 8-bit CPU with Flash on a monolithic chip, the Atmel AT89C51 is a powerful microcomputer, which provides a highly flexible and cost-effective solution to many embedded control applications. By using this controller the data inputs from the smart card is passed to the parallel port of the pc and accordingly the software responds. The IDE for writing the embedded program used is KEI L software.

Keil Micro vision Integrated Development Environment

Keil Software development tools for the 8051 micro controller family support every level of developer from the professional applications engineer to the student just learning about embedded software development.The industry-standard Keil C Compilers, Macro Assemblers, Debuggers, Real-time Kernels, and Single-board Computers support ALL 8051-compatible derivatives and help you get your projects completed on schedule.The source code is written in assembly language .It is saved as ASM file with an extension. A51.the ASM file is converted into hex file using keil software. Hex file is dumped into micro controller using LABTOOL software. At once the file is dumped and the ROM is burnt then it becomes an embedded one.



Step Motor Advantages
Step motors convert electrical energy into precise mechanical motion. These motors rotate a specific incremental distance per each step. The number of steps executed controls the degree of rotation of the motor’s shaft. This characteristic makes step motors excellent for positioning applications. For example, a 1.8° step motor executing 100 steps will rotate exactly 180° with some small amount of non-cumulative error. The speed of step execution controls the rate of motor rotation. A 1.8° step motor executing steps at a speed of 200 steps per second will rotate at exactly 1 revolution per second.
Step motors can be very accurately controlled in terms of how far and how fast they will rotate. The number of steps the motor executes is equal to the number of pulse commands it is given. A step motor will rotate a distance and at a rate that is proportional to the number and frequency of its pulse commands.

Step motors have several advantages over other types of motors. One of the most impressive is their ability to position very accurately. NMB’s standard step motors have an accuracy of +/-5%. The error does not accumulate from step to step. This means that a standard step motor can take a single step and travel 1.8° +/-0.09°. Then it can take one million steps and travel 1,800,000° +/-0.09°. This characteristic gives a step motor almost perfect repeatability. In motor terms, repeatability is the ability to return to a previously held position. A step motor can achieve the same target position, revolution after revolution.

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