Author Topic: Wireless communication using radios  (Read 1667 times)

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Offline Warhawk87Topic starter

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Wireless communication using radios
« on: April 22, 2014, 12:03:55 PM »
Hi all,

So I am developing an idea for a project I want to work on.  I have a Bluetooth device that I want to use to communicate with multiple robots.  I want to have a maximum communication range of 100 meters between the device and the robots.  I also do not want my signals to be largely affected by walls within that range.  Bluetooth doesn't have those kinds of capabilities, and my device only uses Bluetooth. Radio, on the other hand, does.

So my current thoughts are, I can design a circuit with a Bluetooth receiver, a microcontroller, and a radio antenna. This circuit would act as an intermediary between my Bluetooth device and the robots.  Bluetooth messages would be read by the uc and converted into a packet radio message and vice versa. 

The problem is I know very little about radios. I have done some research before posting here, and it has helped give me a better idea of what I am dealing with, but I still have questions like which frequency should I use? How much power? What kind of antenna should I use? I want this circuit to be able to fit into no bigger than a 5cm x 5cm x 0.5cm box.  Does that restrict the size of the antenna, or can the antenna loop inside the box allowing it to be as long as the perimeter of the box?

If you guys can answer these questions given this little information, that's great, but I'm more interested in figuring out how I can answer these questions. If you know any good tutorials for designing something like this or if you could give an explanation of how to go about solving this, I would highly appreciate it!

Thanks in advance!

Offline jwatte

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Re: Wireless communication using radios
« Reply #1 on: April 22, 2014, 04:29:04 PM »
There are a few options:

1) Use an Xbee Pro module on each end. Especially with external antenna, these will easily go 100 meters, even with walls in the way.

2) Use a cell-phone GPRS based shield/module to get IP communications both ways.

3) If you just need to send data one way, get an RC car/airplane transmitter/controller to send the data one way.

4) Get an amateur radio license ("HAM radio") and use available packet radio systems for the frequencies that are allowed.

Offline Warhawk87Topic starter

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Re: Wireless communication using radios
« Reply #2 on: April 22, 2014, 07:48:03 PM »
The Xbee Pro is a nice find! I'll take a look at that and some of the others that are like it.  Thanks!

 


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