Published April 14, 2024 © GPL3+

Door Closing Robot for Zoom Meetings

Working from home can be full of noise and distractions. Now, when I join a Zoom meeting, this robot closes my office door!

IntermediateFull instructions provided4 hours1,495

Things used in this project

Hardware components

Particle Photon 2

Adafruit DC Motor + Stepper FeatherWing Add-on For All Feather Boards

DG01D-W/LEADS Gear Motor Pair with Leads and Breadboard Pins, 90 Degree Shaft

Wheels - 65mm (Rubber Tire, Pair)

4xAA battery holder

Software apps and online services

Adafruit-MotorShield-V2 library

Microsoft Visual Studio Code

Zapier

Zoom

Story

Why I built it

Working from home can be full of noise and distractions. If I remember before joining a meeting, I get up and close my office door. If I forget, I sometimes have to excuse myself from the meeting to go and close it. Now, thanks to Particle.io and Zapier, when I join a Zoom meeting, this little guy automatically closes my office door for me!

Materials

Particle Photon 2 - Particle's latest board that includes Dual-band Wi-Fi
Adafruit's DC Motor + Stepper FeatherWing Add-on For All Feather Boards
A pair of Dagu DC Motors
A pair of 65mm Robot Wheels
A 4 "AA" Enclosed Battery Holder (powers the motors)
Various Makeblock Robot Brackets
LiPo battery (powers the Photon 2)
PCB Board, pins, jumpers, cable ties

Assembly

1. Solder headers and pins on the PCB board to accommodate the Photon 2 and Motor Control board.

2. Install the boards.

3. Assemble the Makeblock brackets.

4. Attach the PCB board to the top and the battery holder to the bottom using double-sided tape.

5. Attach the Photon 2 antenna, add jumpers, and do some cable management.

6. Attach and wire in the DC motors (more cable management).

7. Add the wheels.

8. Power it up!

9. Attach the robot to the bottom of the door using double-sided tape.

Controlling the Robot

I tested controlling the robot at will using the Particle platform, but I wanted to automate it to close the door whenever I joined a Zoom meeting. So, I used Zapier to build a Zap to take care of this job.

Zapier lets you automate tasks and has native integrations with thousands of apps and platforms. Zapier's Zoom integration let me easily create a Zap that is triggered whenever I join a Zoom meeting.

Unfortunately, Zapier does not integrate natively with the Particle platform. But, it does support webhooks, so that's the strategy I used.

Particle has an article to build an integration to Zapier here: https://docs.particle.io/integrations/community-integrations/zapier/

Testing

Zapier lets you test you Zaps while creating them, but I wanted to do it live. So I scheduled a Zoom meeting and, when I joined it, here's the result:

I also added a function to open the door, but I have to cheat by unlatching the door handle first. Here's the video:

Conclusion

This was a fun weekend project with a purpose. Now, I'm assured my door will be closed when I'm in a Zoom meeting and I don't have to get up each time to do it!

Code

Door Opening Robot

/* 
 * Project Door Opening Robot
 * Author: Mike Soniat
 * Date: April 2024
 */

#include "Particle.h"
#include "application.h"
#include "Adafruit-MotorShield-V2.h"
#include "Adafruit_PWMServoDriver.h"

// Let Device OS manage the connection to the Particle Cloud
SYSTEM_MODE(AUTOMATIC);

// Run the application and system concurrently in separate threads
SYSTEM_THREAD(ENABLED);

// Show system, cloud connectivity, and application logs over USB
// View logs with CLI using 'particle serial monitor --follow'
SerialLogHandler logHandler(LOG_LEVEL_INFO);

// Create the motor shield object with the default I2C address
Adafruit_MotorShield AFMS = Adafruit_MotorShield(); 

// Create motor objects
Adafruit_DCMotor *leftMotor = AFMS.getMotor(1);
Adafruit_DCMotor *rightMotor = AFMS.getMotor(2);

//motor function
int moveMotor(String command)
{
  if (command == "close")
  {
    leftMotor->run(FORWARD);
    rightMotor->run(FORWARD);
    Particle.publish("close");
    delay(4000);
    
  }
  else if (command == "open")
  {
    leftMotor->run(BACKWARD);
    rightMotor->run(BACKWARD);
    Particle.publish("open");
    delay(2000);  
    
  }
  leftMotor->run(RELEASE);
  rightMotor->run(RELEASE);
  delay(1000);
  return atoi(command);
}

void setup() {
  Serial.begin(9600);   

  //init Particle functions
  Particle.function("MOVE", moveMotor);

  //init motor driver
  AFMS.begin();
  leftMotor->setSpeed(255);
  rightMotor->setSpeed(255);
  leftMotor->run(FORWARD);
  rightMotor->run(FORWARD);
  leftMotor->run(RELEASE);
  rightMotor->run(RELEASE);

}

void loop() {

}

Credits

mikesoniat

6 projects • 11 followers

I've been an electronics hobbyist, hacker, maker for as long as I can remember. My current passions are robotics, AI, and machine learning.

Door Closing Robot for Zoom Meetings

Things used in this project

Hardware components

Software apps and online services

Story

Why I built it

Materials

Assembly

Controlling the Robot

Testing

Conclusion

Schematics

Wiring Diagram

Code

Door Opening Robot

Credits

mikesoniat

Comments

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Door Closing Robot for Zoom Meetings

Door Closing Robot for Zoom Meetings

Things used in this project

Hardware components

Software apps and online services

Story

Why I built it

Materials

Assembly

Controlling the Robot

Testing

Conclusion

Schematics

Wiring Diagram

Code

Door Opening Robot

Credits

mikesoniat

Comments

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