CLAWAR 2019 WORKSHOP
CONTROL SYSTEM ENGINEERING IN ACTION
Control engineering is a very important knowledge with vast applications in diverse systems – from engineering, biological, social to economic systems. It is a subject taught at the tertiary level. However, students must be exposed or made aware of the importance of this subject at earlier stage of their education such as at the secondary level. The use of the Internet of Things (IoT) technology has allowed more efficient implementation of cyber-physical system, common in control engineering. For better understanding, this workshop will be arranged into 3 different but related sessions by representatives of the Malaysian Society for Automatic Control Engineers (MACE). The first is on the development and use of an educational mobile robot, called ‘COMEL’, in teaching the basics of robotics (that has a lot of control elements) to lower secondary students to encourage their interests in STEM, by Dr Muralindran Mariappan from Universiti Malaysia Sabah (UMS). It will be followed by the second session on development of control systems for FGK, a retrofit electronic fuel injection system by Dr Hazlina Selamat from Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM). Finally, Dr Irfan Hilmy from International Islamic University of Malaysia (IIUM) will share the topic on the use of open source IoT platform in simulating a monitoring system for machines. The participants of this workshop will experience some interesting hands-on activities.
Session 1: COMEL – A Mobile Robot to Promote STEM Education
Ir Dr Muralindran Mariappan
Robotics & Intelligent Systems Research Group,
Universiti Malaysia Sabah
murali@ums.edu.my
Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) education is a critical field in current times due to fewer students are interested in science stream. The Malaysian education policy of 60:40 in science and arts is currently not achieved. To address this issue and to be in line with the Industrial Revolution 4.0, the minimalist robot is utilized for promoting the STEM education at lower secondary level. This educational mobile minimalist robot uses an Arduino platform and is named as ‘COMEL’. Coupled with a correct approach and suitable software, the unexposed younger generations can be motivated and research conducted has proven the success of this endeavor. This workshop will highlight the components of the educational module using ‘COMEL’ and the journey to fine tune the module and the training done in rural areas to achieve the goal of creating interest among students in STEM. The presenter has worked closely with MOSTI and YIM to produce a Y-DUNO ROBOT guided manual to achieve this task and also has won the STEM Teaching Innovation Award at MTE 2019.
Session 2: Control System Development for FGK
Assoc. Prof. Ir Dr Hazlina Selamat
Centre for Artificial Intelligence Robotics (CAIRO),
Universiti Teknologi Malaysia
hazlina@utm.my
Control system is the brain running behind any automated systems and processes that ensures their stability, reliability and desired response. It manages, commands, directs, or regulates the behavior of these devices or systems. This part of the workshop discusses the use of control system engineering in FGK, a retrofit fuel injection system for small engine applications. FGK is aproduct developed by UTM and UTHM that have been sold to users in more than 13 countries. It replaces the existing carburettor on a motorcycle with a low-cost fuel injection system and can provide up to 34% improvement in fuel economy with better power delivery. FGK consists of a throttle body and fuel injection system with specially designed intake manifold and an electronic control unit (ECU) module. The amount of fuel injected is carefully calculated and controlled by the ECU developed by our very own experts. The fuel map in the ECU can also be tuned by individual users using Ignitus, an ECU tuning software that we developed. This product will benefit 120 million carburetted motorcycle users worldwide who urgently need an affordable solution towards lower daily fuel expenses. Using the concept of open-loop and closed-loop control system design, I will explain how control system is used in real products and the challenges in implementing it for mass production. I will also briefly share how our work at Apt Touch Sdn Bhd make use of the Internet of Things (IoT) technology in monitoring various parameters from the ECU of FGK.
Session 3: Simulation of Machine Monitoring System Using Open Source IoT Platform
Dr. Irfan Hilmy
Faculty of Engineering,
International Islamic University Malaysia
ihilmy@iium.edu.my
Industrial IoT is the wave of the future for manufacturing because the goal in any plant or on any factory floor is to reduce costs to improve profitability without compromising quality and, therefore, remaining competitive. Machine monitoring involves installing web-enabled machine monitoring systems on every machine, throughout the factory floor and on every line. With data being collected continually, on every machine and from every operator in real-time, operators and managers are in a better position to harness that intelligence and make decisions that will improve efficiency across the board. Machines can also effectively self-monitor and flag operators when there is an impending problem, like a failure. Monitoring system will enablemonitoring of the condition of the machine, processing of the collected telemetry with various alerting rules, distribution of collected alarms to assigned facility managers and visualization of real-time and historical values on the configurable web dashboards. To implement this IoT monitoring system, ThingsBoard platform will be utilized. ThingsBoard is an open-source IoT platform for data collection, processing, visualization, and device management. ThingsBoard enables rapid development, management and scaling of IoT projects. The goal is to provide the out-of-the-box IoT cloud or on-premises solution that will enable server-side infrastructure for your IoT applications.
