Post by Shyamen Migara

There is nothing quite like watching a theoretical circuit leap off the screen and into the real world! 🚀 For our Electronic and Circuit Devices module mini-project, my team and I designed, simulated, and built an autonomous Line Following Robot entirely from scratch. Check out the demo video below to see it in action! 🎥👇 Instead of relying on a microcontroller, we built this using pure analog logic to deepen our understanding of core hardware fundamentals. Here is a breakdown of our engineering process: 🔍 The Hardware Architecture: ✒️Sensing Unit: Custom-tuned IR sensors paired with LEDs to accurately detect the line contrast and feed real-time environmental data to the circuit. 💻Processing Unit:An LM358 Operational Amplifier configured as a comparator. It continuously compares the IR sensor voltages against a reference threshold to make instantaneous steering decisions. 📈Design & Simulation: Before soldering a single component, we rigorously tested our schematic using Proteus to validate the logic and current flows. 🪛Fabrication: We translated our successful simulation into a fully routed custom PCB layout, managing trace widths and component footprints to ensure a clean, reliable build. Bringing this from a Proteus schematic to a physical, working robot was an incredible challenge in calibration and hardware debugging. Huge shoutout to my amazing group partners, Dinithi Thilinika and Kalani Edirisinghe! Late nights troubleshooting sensor sensitivities and refining our PCB traces completely paid off. 💡🔋 What was your favorite hardware project during your undergrad? Let me know in the comments! #ElectricalEngineering #Electronics #Robotics #PCBDesign #Proteus #LM358 #LineFollowingRobot #EngineeringStudent #UniversityOfJaffna #HardwareDesign

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