Hokey stick

Design and prototype a hokey stick that can measure and record kinematic data about the manipulation of a hockey stick.  

• Optimize the Low-cost Tape Sensor

• Build first prototype, see David's reaction and decide for next steps.

• Write the path to market

The Project

Integrate bending and motion sensors into a hockey stick in order to provide almost real-time feedback on performance. The basic idea is to collect all the important parameters that characterize the manipulation of a hockey stick during a normal game. The data is crunched and sent wireless to a mobile device to be further analysed. The mobile device contains a model the motion patterns applied in different types of actions during a hockey game. It also contains different profiles of "good players". 

One possible application is to compare the motion pattern of a user with the patterns of "good players", and to provide to the user a path to improvement. Other applications can be performance monitoring over time, with fatigue, etc. 

Data from the mobile device can also be socialized, i.e. shared on social media with other users. 

[from Wikipedia] 

The Quantified Self is a movement to incorporate technology into data acquisition on aspects of a person's daily life in terms of inputs (e.g. food consumed, quality of surrounding air), states (e.g. mood, arousal, blood oxygen levels), and performance (mental and physical). Such self-monitoring and self-sensing, which combines wearable sensors (EEG, ECG, video, etc.) and wearable computing, is also known as lifelogging. Other names for using self-tracking data to improve daily functioning are “self-tracking”, "auto-analytics", “body hacking” and “self-quantifying”.

Background

This project was created after the visit of Pr. David Pearsall's lab at McGill University during the summer of 2012, by Ivan, Francois, Jonathan and TiTiberius Brastaviceanubi. See presentation made. It became clear then that Sensorica can play an important role in the market of sports equipment. 

David needed an accurate and fast bending sensor to be applied on a hockey stick. At the beginning of the project, the team thought to apply the joint transducer to this application. 

In September of that same year the same team made a presentation at the Canadian Space Agency and discovered a need for a very precise bending sensor (see meeting notes). A four optical fiber-based bending sensor was presented to Pr. Zhu at Sensorica lab in Montreal, on April 2013 (see photo album of this demo). From this project, the Low-cost tape sensor was born. It became evident that this type of sensor was suitable for the hockey stick project. 

A few designs of the low cost tape sensor were proposed and one prototype was successfully tested in June 2013 (see more). Around the same date, Rodrigo started to redesign the low-cost tape sensor in order to adapt it to mass production. 

In June 2013 we were approached by a Montreal-based company who has already integrated motion sensors into a hockey stick and were looking for a low-cost and reliable bending sensor (see meeting notes - please keep this doc confidential for the moment, the company wants to remain under the radar). We are exploring ways to collaborate and have agreed to formalize our collaboration starting in September 2013. 

Sensors are also making their appearance in sports. We already see smart clothing, sending data about vital signs, performance, physiological parameters, etc.. We also see smart equipment like tennis rackets and hockey sticks, capable of sensing movement, acceleration, orientation, force, etc. These accessories will tell their users how to improve their performance. All this is part of quantified self movement. BUT a tennis racket loaded with sensors will not tell you anything if you don't have a model to make sense of the data! This is where smart people making sensors meet smart people understanding kinesiology in sports, like David Pearsall, to make smart sports equipment. 

This is yet another example of complex products that can only come into existence through collaboration, within our value network. Our goal is to harvest the open source soft- and hardware, use the open science created by people like David and his team, to create open source smart sports equipment. 

For Diigo database tag with sports_project

Communication channels

• Messaging: ...

• Social media: ...

Coordination tools

• Shared calendar