Ultrasonic ranging embedded system for industrial automation scenarios

Abstract

Addressing the industrial automation sector’s requirement for high-precision non-contact distance detection, this paper presents an ultrasonic ranging embedded system based on an STM32 microcontroller. The system hardware utilizes an STM32F103 series microcontroller as its core. This microcontroller controls the transmission of drive signals to the ultrasonic sensor (HC-SR04), receives and processes the echo signals, precisely measures the time-of-flight, and calculates the distance. The system software was developed using the Keil MDK environment. A 0.91-inch OLED display (model 12832) shows the measurement results. The system also supports adding audible and visual alarms. Experimental results demonstrate that within a range of 10 cm to 100 cm, the rangefinder achieves an absolute error of less than ±2 cm and a relative error below 2%. Its response time is under 0.5seconds, indicating high measurement accuracy and excellent real-time performance.