Fire detection and rescue robot

The project began by defining a practical problem: how a compact mobile robot can enter a hazardous environment, detect a potential fire source, and perform an initial firefighting operation without requiring a person to directly enter the dangerous area.

Based on this objective, we designed a self-defined disaster exploration environment for the robot. The environment was divided into three major sections: an obstacle zone, a narrow passage, and a fire-response zone.

The obstacle zone was designed to test the robot's ability to perceive and avoid physical obstacles. The narrow passage was introduced to test whether the robot could maintain stable movement under spatial constraints. The fire-response zone was designed as the final task area, where the robot detects a flame source and performs the firefighting operation.

The robot and the physical environment were designed together rather than treating the robot as an independent device. This allowed us to establish a complete task flow from environmental exploration to fire detection and firefighting, providing the basis for subsequent hardware integration and software development.

After defining the exploration scenario, we started building the physical robot platform and integrating the main hardware components.

The robot uses an STM32F103C8T6 microcontroller as the main control unit. The motor driver and dual DC motors were integrated first to establish basic movement functions, including forward movement, backward movement, turning, and stopping.

We then integrated the ultrasonic sensor, infrared sensors, flame sensor, servo motor, water pump, OLED display, and wireless communication module. Each module was tested individually before being integrated into the main control system.

At this stage, the main focus was to establish a stable hardware and software foundation for subsequent autonomous functions. We also adjusted the motor control parameters and communication commands according to the actual movement behavior of the physical robot.

After completing the basic hardware integration and manual movement control, we developed the robot's autonomous movement functions.

An ultrasonic sensor was integrated to detect obstacles in front of the robot. When an obstacle is detected within a predefined distance, the control system adjusts the robot's movement to reduce the risk of collision.

At the same time, infrared sensors were integrated for line following. The sensors detect the predefined path on the ground and provide feedback to the motion control system, allowing the robot to maintain its position along the designed route.

During physical testing, we adjusted the motor control parameters, sensor response thresholds, movement timing, and turning behavior according to the actual performance of the robot. The obstacle avoidance and line-following functions were then combined to support continuous movement through the designed exploration environment.

After completing the basic autonomous movement functions, we focused on developing the robot's core firefighting capability.

A flame sensor was integrated into the robot to detect potential fire sources. To improve the detection process, the sensor was mounted on a servo mechanism so that it could scan different directions when searching for a flame.

Once a flame is detected, the robot can stop its movement and use the servo mechanism to adjust the sensing direction toward the detected fire source. The control system then activates the water pump to perform water spraying.

During development, we repeatedly tested the flame sensor, servo movement, and water pump under different physical conditions. The servo angle, detection response, and pump control were adjusted based on the actual behavior of the robot.

The completed subsystem established the basic process of fire detection, directional searching, and automatic water spraying, which became the core firefighting function of the final robot.

After completing the basic movement and firefighting functions, we further expanded the robot's perception and interaction capabilities.

A camera was integrated as an additional visual sensing method for flame recognition. Compared with relying only on the flame sensor, the camera provides visual information that can be used to identify potential flame sources and improve the robot's overall perception capability.

We also developed a voice control interface on the computer side. Speech recognition is used to convert Chinese voice commands into control commands that are transmitted to the robot through wireless serial communication. The system supports commands such as moving forward, moving backward, turning, stopping, obstacle avoidance, and switching to firefighting-related operating modes.

During integration, we tested the communication between the voice-control interface and the embedded controller, and adjusted the command mapping and response behavior to ensure that voice commands could be correctly transmitted to the robot.

The addition of visual flame recognition and voice interaction expanded the system from a basic autonomous mobile platform into a more flexible robot that combines environmental perception, autonomous operation, and human-robot interaction.

In the final development stage, we integrated the robot's movement, environmental sensing, fire detection, visual recognition, firefighting, and human-robot interaction functions into one complete system.

The integrated system was tested in the self-defined disaster exploration environment. The final task flow was designed as:

START → obstacle zone → narrow passage → fire-response zone → flame detection → fire searching → automatic water spraying → task completion.

During the final testing stage, we focused on the coordination and stability of the different subsystems. We checked the robot's movement through the obstacle area and narrow passage, the response of the flame detection system, the servo scanning behavior, the activation of the water pump, and the communication between the computer-side control interface and the robot.

Several rounds of integrated testing and adjustment were performed based on the actual physical behavior of the robot. The final prototype was able to demonstrate the complete process from environmental exploration and fire detection to firefighting in a real physical test environment.

The completed system demonstrates the practical integration of embedded control, multi-sensor perception, visual recognition, autonomous movement, human-robot interaction, and physical firefighting in a compact mobile robot.