home
HomeContact MeFamilyIFS
Projects
> Projects > High Performance Lawn Mower > GPS based path tracking - 30 minutes
Playa Computer
Invisible Gold
Fractals
Honda Insight
Pedal Generator
High Performance Lawn Mower
Photography Portfolio
Green Home
In Car GPS Systems
Spy Van
Shake Flashlights
Online Tarot Card Readings
Tea House
911
Desktop Backgrounds
Insight Battery

GPS based path tracking - 30 minutes

click to expand
click to expand
You know that turning point in a project when it goes from bad to worse? Well, um, I hooked a computer and GPS up to my mower and plotted the mowing path. The results are surprising.

First of all, I was really thinking about the path...and second, I had lots of expensive hardware on a bumpy ride (yes, I spilled gas on the computer). So it felt like I went very slowly and the lawn was done in 30 minutes!

The trick I think was to maximize long paths. Normally I would mow a section (for example "the back yard") and finish it before moving on to the next. Instead, I tried to avoid making turns and overlapped as necessary.

The actual driving time was less than 30 minutes. Perhaps the next improvement is to be made in the "pits".

NOTE: The GPS plot may not be 100% accurate. I have a theory that the software is trying to match previous paths. (It's the car navigation software Mapopolis on the PocketPC - The laptop in the picture was just for setup and configuration. I used Excel to do the plot.)