Autonomous Mower Travelling Containment Zones for Full Coverage
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Solution Overview
Problem
Robotic lawn mowers often fail to efficiently cover all areas of a property due to random travel patterns and variable property layouts, leading to uneven cutting and potential getting stuck in narrow passages.
Innovation Solution
Implementing a travelling containment zone within the work region, defined and controlled by a controller, to constrain the mower's operation, ensuring even coverage and avoiding obstacles.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Productivity
If the mower operates in a random travel pattern within the entire work region, then the mower can access all areas including narrow passages, but the mower may get unduly hung-up and extend completion time
Solution Approach 1:
The work region is segmented into multiple smaller containment zones that the mower operates through sequentially. Each containment zone is a restricted sub-area within the larger work region, allowing the mower to systematically cover the entire area without wandering into problematic narrow passages repeatedly.
Solution Approach 2:
The containment zones are dynamic rather than static - they are continuously adjusted and repositioned during operation. The controller modifies the containment zone boundaries and positions based on the mower's current location and progress, enabling adaptive navigation that avoids getting stuck while ensuring complete coverage.
2Manufacturing precision
If the mower operates in a random travel pattern within the entire work region, then the mower can potentially cover all areas, but the coverage becomes uneven with some areas mowed longer than needed
Solution Approach 1:
The controller pre-plans the mower's path through the containment zones before operation begins. The containment zones are strategically positioned and sized to ensure systematic coverage, preventing the mower from revisiting already-mowed areas and eliminating redundant cutting passes.
Solution Approach 2:
The system continuously monitors the mower's position and the status of containment zones, using this feedback to dynamically adjust zone boundaries and transition points. This real-time feedback ensures that the mower transitions between zones at optimal moments, maintaining uniform cutting coverage across the entire work region.
3Productivity
If the mower is constrained to a smaller containment zone within the work region, then the mower avoids getting stuck and completes operation faster, but the containment zone area is less than the total work region area
Solution Approach 1:
The containment zone is not a fixed restriction but a dynamic operating window that continuously moves and expands across the work region. The controller systematically shifts the containment zone boundaries to encompass new areas, ensuring that the full work region is eventually covered while maintaining the productivity benefits of constrained operation at any given moment.
Data Source
AI summary
Apparatus, systems, and methods for directing an autonomous robotic vehicle such as a lawn mower relative to a work region. In some embodiments, the vehicle travels in a random pattern within a travelling containment zone of a lesser size than the work region. The travelling containment zone may move or travel across the work region such that, over time, the travelling containment zone travels over most all of a working surface of the work region.