Digital Fuel Meter
G.Kiran Kumar M.Venkat Bharadwaj K.Ashok Reddy
Associate Professor & HOD, B.Tech (CSE), B.Tech (CSE),
MLR Institute of Technology, Hyd. MLR Institute of Technology, Hyd. MLR Institute of Technology, Hyd.
G.Piyush Jain Nampalli Venu S.Gopi Nath
B.Tech (CSE), B.Tech (CSE), B.Tech (CSE),
MLR Institute of Technology, Hyd. MLR Institute of Technology, Hyd. MLR Institute of Technology, Hyd.
Venkata Siva Rao
Associate Professor, Dept of CSE, MLR Institute of Technology, Hyd.
ABSTRACT: The above furnished fact is considered in the project.
It’s found out that a proper solution for indicating the In the recent times we are constantly hearing about
accurate availability of fuel in the tank digitally. A petrol bunk frauds. Most of the petrol bunks today
sensor and a microcontroller is used to find out the fuel have manipulated the pumps such that it displays the
level which is economic and also accurate. This paper amount as entered but the quantity of fuel filled in the
focuses on the study of various fuel level measuring customer’s tank is much lesser than the displayed
sensors suitable for our project. Some issues with value. I.et the pumps are tampered for the benefit of
respect to the existing level measurement techniques the petrol bunks owner. This results in huge profits for
are identified and so a better alternate digital sensing the petrol bunks but at the same time the customers are
technology has been suggested, described and cheated.
justified.
All the vehicles in India consist of analog meters hence
I.INTRODUCTION: it is not possible to precisely know the amount of fuel
Petrol bunk frauds were very common in recent time. currently in the vehicle and also it is not possible to
Many of the petrol bunks today manipulated pumps cross check the quantity of fuel filled in the petrol
such that it displays the amount as entered, but in bunk. In this project we focuses on creating a digital
reality, the quantity of fuel filled in the customer’s display of the exact amount of fuel contained in the
tank is much lesser than the displayed value. The vehicles tank and also help in cross checking the
pumps are cheated for the benefit of the petrol bunk quantity of fuel filled at the petrol bunk. Finally once
owner. This results in huge profits for the petrol bunks, the fuel is filled at a bunk the device also sends an
but at the same time the customers are being cheated. SMS to the vehicle owner indicating the amount,
Majority of the two wheeler vehicles in India consist quantity, and date, time etc. And also we can find the
of analog meters which will not help to precisely know exact location of the vehicle.
the amount of fuel currently in the vehicle and also it is
not possible to cross check the quantity of fuel filled at Problem Statement
the petrol bunk. Also in this modern and competitive To design a fuel metering system that can report the
world, products are being digitized owing to its exact amount of fuel in the tank. The amount should be
benefits, user friendliness. So we are conducting a reported in a digital readoutand should be in unit of
project named “design and development of a digital either liters and in km’s at average/current
fuel level indicator for two wheelers”. It consists of consumption.
creating a digital display for the exact volume of fuel
contained in the fuel tank.
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Vision and Mission There are various techniques to implement sensing and
Up until now the accuracy of the fuel level indicating systems.
measurement has not been of great importance. The
purpose measuring the fuel level has been to present • Traditional float type measurement technique
the information on the dashboard with a fuel level • Microcontroller based fuel measurement technique
meter. Instead of accuracy the two most important
things have been to avoid rapid changes in the fuel
Presently the most common and traditional fuel
level displayed and the meter must indicate that the
indicator system makes use of the resistive float type
tank is empty when the fuel level is below a predefined
sensors to measure the level of fuel in the tank and this
level. This system is not capable to provide the exact
system consists of two units i.e., the sender unit
value of fuel in the fuel tank. Also such system cannot
responsible to measure the level of fuel in the tank, the
protect us from getting cheated at petrol pumps and
gauge until responsible to display the measured fuel
this cost more for less amount of fuel so filled. So it
level to the driver. Another technique is known as the
becomes necessary to develop such a system which
Smart fuel gauge system, which is similar to the
gives exact (numeric) value of fuel in fuel tank.
traditional technique but also makes use of embedded
As used in cars, the fuel gauge has two parts:-
systems such as microcontrollers or microprocessors
for providing better accuracy.
The sender unit
The indicator
The sending unit usually uses a float connected to a
variable resistor. When the tank is full, the resistor is
set to its low resistance value. In addition, when the
resistance is at a certain point, it will also turn on a
"low fuel" light on some vehicles. Meanwhile, the
indicator unit (usually mounted on the instrument
panel) is measuring and displaying the amount of
electrical current flowing through the sending unit.
When the tank level is high and maximum current is Fig 1: Block Diagram
flowing, the needle points to "F" indicating a full tank.
When the tank is empty and the least current is
flowing, the needle points to "E" indicating an empty
tank.
A gauge (or gas gauge) is an instrument used to
indicate the level of fuel contained in a tank.
Commonly used in cars, it may also be used for any
tank including underground storage tanks. The system
consists of two important parts that is for sensing and
indication of fuel level. The sensing unit usually uses a
float type sensor to measure fuel level while the
indicator system measures the amount of electric
current flowing through the sensing unit and indicates Fig 2: Circuit Diagram
fuel level.
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II.EXISTING TECHNOLOGY
Introduction
Most of the vehicles in India consist of analog meters
hence it is not possible to precisely know the amount
of fuel currently in the vehicle and also it is not
possible to cross check the quantity of fuel filled in the
petrol bunk. The traditional fuel indicator consists of
two units i.e. the sending unit and the gauge. The Fig 3
shows the commonly used traditional fuel Fig 3: Traditional fuel measurement system
measurement system. The sending unit is located in the
fuel tank of the car and it consists of a float, usually The smart fuel gauge system techniques has been
made of foam, connected to a thin, metal rod. The end implemented in some newer cars in which, instead of
of the metal rod is mounted on a variable resister or sending the current directly to the gauge, an
potentiometer. intermediate microprocessor is used to read the output
of the resistor and then communicate with the
The variable resistor consists of a strip of resistive dashboard for displaying the fuel on the gauge
material over it which moves across the variable corresponding to read output voltage from sending unit
resistor changing the resistance and flow of current and these system actually help to improve accuracy of
depending on the movement of the float with respect to system.
the level of fuel present in the fuel tank. The Fig 3
shows that the fuel in the fuel tank is almost empty and III.COMPARISION OF EXISTING
the float has moved to the bottom of the tank moving TECHNOLOGIES
the strip on the resistor thus increasing the resistance to The traditional float type resistive measurement
maximum and current flow through the resistor technique has bad accuracy issues compared to that of
becomes minimum thus displaying fuel empty on the the microcontroller based technique and the reason for
gauge. this is its mechanism, it is noticed that the gauge tends
to stay on full for quite awhile after filling up and this
The gauge consists of a bimetallicstrip i.e. a strip made is because when the tank is full, the float is at its
of different kinds of metal and whose thermal co- maximum raised position while its upward movement
efficient of expansion differs from each other. When is limited either by the rod its connected to or by the
resistance is decreases current increases and thus the top of the tank and therefore this means that the float is
strip is heated during which one metal expands less submerged and it won’t start to sink until the fuel level
than the other, so the strip curves and this bending drops to almost the bottom of the float, hence the
action is what moves the needle move on the fuel needle on the gauge won’t start to move until the float
gauge. As resistance increases, less current passes starts to sink.
through the heating coil, so the bimetallic strip cools.
As the strip cools, it straightens out, pulling the gauge Something similar can happen when the float nears the
from full to empty. bottom of the tank.Often, the range of motion does not
extend to the very bottom as shown in Fig (1), so the
float can reach the bottom of its travel while there is
still fuel in the tank. This is why, on most cars, the
needle goes below empty and eventually stops moving
while there is still gas left in the tank. The newer cars
have a microprocessor that reads the variable resistor
in the tank and communicates that reading to another
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microprocessor in the dashboard thus displaying the
fuel level and a fuel light indicator signal with respect
to the fuel level such as a red light when low on fuel
and green light when tank is full. In this technique, the
Car makers can tinker with the gauge movement a
little while compensating for the shape of the tank by
comparing the float position to a calibration curve and
this curve correlates the position of the float with the
Fig 4: Capacitive level sensing
volume of fuel left in the tank. This allows the gauge
to read more accurately, especially in cars with Since the capacitance is directly proportional to the
complicated gas-tank shapes The microprocessor can dielectric constant between the parallel rods or plates,
also provide some damping to the needle movement therefore the fuel rising between the two parallel rods
i.e. leads to increase or change in the net capacitance value
of the measuring tankas a function of fluid height. If
when the car goes around a turn, or up a hill, the fuel the dielectric behaves even slightly as a conductor then
can slosh to one side of the tank and quickly change this can reduce the performance of the capacitor. The
the float position and if the needle were to respond dielectric material used should ideally be an insulator
quickly to all of these changes, it would be bouncing while chemically fuel will have other contents mixed
all over the place, instead the software calculates a in it increasing the conductivity of electrons to some
moving average of the last several readings of the float extent; therefore a common method used to overcome
position. This means that changes in needle position this problem is placing an insulating layer on each of
occur more slowly; therefore this may have been the rods in order to preserve the performance of the
noticed when filling up car tank that the tank is measuring system. Capacitive type fuel level
fulfilled long before the needle reaches full, however measurement system can make use of multiple
the cost of implementing this technique is more capacitors or multi-plate capacitors which has an
expensive and complex compared to that of the advantage of an increased capacitance value and
traditional technique, therefore the trade off in the accuracy.Multi capacitor systems share the common
microprocessor based technique is the cost and dielectric constant, which is essentially the fluid itself
complexity for gaining accuracy and its vice versa for in capacitive type fluid level measurement systems. If
the traditional technique i.e trade off accuracy for a capacitor is constructed with ‘n’ number of parallel
reducing cost of development and complexity of the plates, then the overall capacitance will be increased
system. by a factor of (n-1)
IV.CAPACITIVE LEVEL SENSING Advantages of capacitance
In a capacitive fuel level sensing system, the capacitive
sensors have two conducting terminals electrodes and • Cost effective
the gap between the two rods is fixed the fuel level can • Fast speed of response
be found by measuring the capacitance between the • Interface measurement
two conductors immersed into the fuel as shown in the
Figure. V.SPECIFICATIONS
Introduction to Specifications
Microcontroller (PIC16F77A)
Display Unit
Permanent Data Storage unit
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RS232 Permanent Data Storage Unit
Regulator (7805) If power fail occurs, the content of the RAM must be
Rectifier stored in EEPROM so that when power is back, the
Proximity sensor meter can start from its last state. An I2C EEPROM
LCD (AT24C64) of 8KB size is used for this purpose. Also,
different billing slabs containing rates for peak and off
Brief on all specifications peak hour, meter ID etc. are stored here.
Microcontroller (PIC16F77A)
An 8051 architecture microcontroller is used as the RS232
microcontroller unit. The 8051 is an 8 bit Reduced RS-232 is simple, universal, well understood and
Instruction Set Computer (RISC) microcontroller. It supported but it has some serious shortcomings as a
has four 8 bit ports, total 32 I/O lines. Different data interface. The standards to 256kbps or less and
peripherals of the meter are connected with its ports as line lengths of 15M (50 ft) or less but today we see
shown in Fig6.1. It has 64KB of program memory and high speed ports on our home PC running very high
256 byte of RAM. The Driver Layer contains protocols speeds and with high quality cable maxim distance has
for accessing different hardware peripherals such as increased greatly. The rule of thumb for the length a
LCD, EEPROM, RTC, LR, GSM modem, etc. data cable depends on speed of the data, quality of the
cable.
On the top of the Driver Layer, the Application Layer
contains routines for load calculation, bill calculation, Regulator (7805)
data SMS frame creation, etc. Application Layer calls This series of fixed-voltage integrated-circuit voltage
different routines of the Driver Layer to access regulators is designed for a wide range of applications.
hardware peripherals. This powerful (200 nanosecond These applications include on-card regulation for
instruction execution) yet easy-to-program (only 35 elimination of noise and distribution problems
single word instructions) CMOS FLASH-based 8-bit associated with single-point regulation. Each of these
microcontroller packs Microchip's powerful PIC® regulators can deliver up to 1.5 A of output current.
architecture into an 40- or 44-pin package and is The internal current-limiting and thermal-shutdown
upwards compatible with the PIC16C5X, features of these regulators essentially make them
PIC12CXXX and PIC16C7X devices. immune to overload.
The PIC16F877A features 256 bytes of EEPROM data Rectifier
memory, self-programming, an ICD, 2 Comparators, 8 A rectifier is an electrical device that converts
channels of 10-bit Analog-to-Digital (A/D) converter, alternating current (AC) to direct current (DC), a
2 capture/compare/PWM functions, the synchronous process known as rectification. Rectifiers have many
serial port can be configured as either 3-wire Serial uses including as components of power supplies and as
Peripheral Interface (SPI™) or the 2-wire Inter- detectors of radio signals.
Display Unit Proximity sensors
A 16 x 2 character LCD (HD44780) is interfaced with A proximity sensor is a sensor able to detect the
the micro-controller port using 4 data wire mode. presence of nearby objects without any physical
Different meter readings like current month kWh, total contact. A proximity sensor often emits an
kWh, voltage, current, date, time, etc. are sequentially electromagnetic field or a beam of electromagnetic
displayed here. radiation (infrared, for instance), and looks for changes
in the field or return signal. The object being sensed is
often referred to as the proximity sensor's target.
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Proximity sensors are commonly used on smartphones Interfacing LCD
to detect (and skip) accidental touchscreen taps when Fig 5 shows how to interface the LCD to
held to the ear during a call. They are also used in microcontroller. The 2x16 character LCD interface
machine vibration monitoring to measure the variation card with supports both modes 4-bit and 8-bit
in distance between a shaft and its support bearing. interface, and also facility to adjust contrast through
This is common in large steam turbines, compressors, trim pot. In 8-bit interface 11 lines needed to create 8-
and motors that use sleeve-type bearings. bit interface; 8 data bits (D0 – D7), three control lines,
address bit (RS), read/write bit (R/W) and control
LCD signal (E).
We are using a high quality 16 character by 2 line
intelligent display module, with back lighting, Works
with almost any microcontroller.
Features
• 16 Characters x 2 Lines
• 5x7 Dot Matrix Character + Cursor
• HD44780 Equivalent LCD Controller/driver Built-In
• 4-bit or 8-bit MPU Interface
• Standard Type Fig 5: Interfacing LCD with PIC16F877A
• Works with almost any Microcontroller
• Great Value Pricing We now want to display a text in PIC16F/18F
Evaluation Board by using LCD module. In
VI.SYSTEM DESIGN PIC16F/18F Evaluation Board contains the LCD
PIC16F/18F Evaluation Board connections in a single header. The PIC16F/18F
The PIC16F/18F Evaluation board is specifically Evaluation board has eleven numbers of LCD
designed to help students to master the required skills connections, connected with I/O Port lines (PORTE.0
in the area of embedded systems. The kit is designed in – PORTE.3 && PORTD.0 – PORTD.7) to make LCD
such way that all the possible features of the display.
microcontroller will be easily used by the students.
The kit supports in system programming (ISP) which
is done through USB port.Microchip’s PIC
(PIC16F877A), PIC16F/18FEvaluation Kit is proposed
to smooth the progress of developing and debugging of
various designs encompassing of High speed 8-bit
Microcontrollers.
LCD (Liquid Crystal Display)
Liquid Crystal Display also called as LCD is very
helpful in providing user interface as well as for
debugging purpose. A liquid crystal display (LCD) is a Fig 6: Circuit Diagram to Interface LCD with
flat panel display that uses the light modulating PIC16F877A Microcontroller
properties of liquid crystals (LCs). LCD Modules can
present textual information to user.
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MICROCONTROLLER (PIC16F877A) Ultrasonic Sensing
The 16F877A is one of the most popular PIC The principle of ultrasonic devices is based on the
microcontrollers and it's easy to see why - it comes in a amount of time it takes to send and receive reflected
40 pin DIP pinout and it has many internal peripherals. ultrasonic sound wave from the media Ultrasonic
The only disadvantage that you could level at it is that waves are similar to audible sound waves in that they
it does not have an internal clock source like most of are mechanical waves. The speed of ultrasonic waves
the other more modern PIC's. The 16F877A is a can be more easily influenced than the speed of light.
capable microcontroller that can do many tasks The temperature and type of gaseous media have a
because it has a large enough programming memory tremendous effect on sound waves. The temperature of
(large in terms of sensor and control projects) 8k the gaseous media influences the speed of the wave.
words and 368 Bytes of RAM. The higher the temperature, the faster the sound waves
travel.
The 40 pins make it easier to use the peripherals as the
functions are spread out over the pins. This makes it While the temperature at the level device can be
easier to decide what external devices to attach without compensated by a temperature sensor in the ultrasonic
worrying too much if there are enough pins to do the device, the level measurement will only be accurate if
job. One of the main advantages is that each pin is the entire space between the sensor and liquid are the
only shared between two or three functions so it’s same temperature. The type of gaseous media also
easier to decide what the pin function (other devices influences the speed of the sound waves. For example,
have up to 5 functions for a pin). sound travels almost three times faster in helium than
it does air. Most ultrasonic devices can be programmed
A slight disadvantage of the device is that it has no for the type of gaseous media the sound waves will
internal oscillator so you will need an external crystal travel through.
or other clock source. However the internal oscillator
is only 1% accurate and adding a crystal (max 20MHz
crystal - for 5MHz internal instruction cycle) and two
15pFcapacitors is not a great chore - the accuracy will
be 100ppm depending on the crystal used.
Ultrasonic Sensor
Ultrasonic sensors can be used to solve even the most
complex tasks involving object detection or level
measurement with millimeter precision, because their
measuring method works reliably under almost all
conditions. No other measuring method can be
successfully put to use on such a wide scale and in so Fig 7: Experimental Testing
many different applications.
VII.CONCLUSION:
The devices are extremely robust, making them The Digital fuel indicator design like that described
suitable for even the toughest conditions. The sensor above will most likely be more accurate, more reliable,
surface cleans itself through vibration, and that is not and cheaper than other analog meters, and will allow
the only reason why the sensor is insensitive to dirt. for added features that benefit both the customer. In
The physical principle—the propagation of sound— the near future, the different vehicle company
works, with a few exceptions, in practically any manufacturers will implement this kind of fuel system
environment. which also provides security for the vehicle owners.
Page 609
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