This is my first post so i hope you will be able to help.
I would like to come up with a parking sensor for my car, as my wife keeps scratching the bumper!
If anyone can point me in the right direction I would much appreciate it.
You could try some sort of device that emmits IR light and at the same time detects the intensity of the light reflected by a surface to tell you how close you are e.g. from a wall.
Don't know how will it work on different materials and textures of the surfaces...
i think ultrasounds work better, it doesnt depend on the surface, in case of the ir .....try to build a sonar a simple transmitter & receiver, set them on an anglr so that at some distance the sound reflects and u will know that u r close to the obstacles.....