Design and implementation of an IMU device for robotics and multimedia

Inertial motion units (IMUs) where conceived as a support element for precision in military navigation systems; now it’s projected to use it to entertain and create music. This paper is a compendium that covers all the stages of the development of the inertial motion unit. The objective of this project was to design and implement an IMU unit using as many resources as possible from other projects going on at MDH. In this manner, the development process would get first hand documentation from the master and PhD students who worked on the listed technologies: PCB design, ATmega micro controllers, USB-Serial communications, Bluetooth ® stack, Honeywell magnetometer, ST Electronics gyroscopes and accelerometer. The project was planned from start analyzing the different stages of the work: data gathering, schematic, layout, manufacturing, mounting, testing, code writing and programming. Before the beginning of the project there has been a learning process of different programming platforms and environment such as ADA, AVR Studio and Cocoa for iPhone applications. After the research was over this paper began to be written. The paper covers the work done from the idea to the first finished version of the firmware of the prototype.