Overview
This was a project team under Aggies Create that I joined a few weeks into my first semester of college. We competed in the 2022 Sick Inc. TiM$10K Challenge (hence our project name), where the goal was to find and develop a novel application for one of their 2D LiDAR sensors.
The first deadline was just two days after our team had been put together, so we had to rush to come up with an idea and submit our abstract. It was only after we submitted that we discovered the deadline had been extended by a month.
We were eventually selected to continue in the competition, and after some shipping delays, our LiDAR sensor finally arrived in December and we got to work. Our initial idea had been a heavy machinery safety system, but for our prototype, we chose to focus on applications for forklifts.
Affectionately named the SAIV (Safety Accessory for Industrial Vehicles), our system could be mounted onto any forklift to provide advance warning to the operator. The LiDAR would detect potential collisions, and the IMU, which was my specialty, would detect potential tipovers.
In the end, we were able to assemble our SAIV and test it on an actual forklift in a warehouse, achieving a success rate of about 80%. And of course, there was also our final product video (see above), produced by yours truly.
We didn't end up winning anything, but nevertheless, it was a valuable learning experience and a sick first engineering project for me.
Our final product video