In this third video released by RS Components, Xun and David are going to show you how to deal with ultrasonic range finders, infrared range finders and a trick using ultrabright white LEDs and LDR sensors and in general how to use different technologies to detect obstacles in the way of the Arduino Robot.

In some way ultrasound and infrared operate in the same way: a signal is sent, it bounces on objects and the received echo is used to estimate the distance. With ultrasound, the speed of sound and the time difference between the sent signal and the received one is used, while infrared is more direct as it gives a stronger or weaker reflection depending on how far the signal travels. The estimation of the distance is done via software.

In the video below you’ll see a couple of examples on how to deal with them but you’ll also learn how simple it can be to build your own reflective sensors using a very strong source of light and an LDR sensor.

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