EBL Sensor Visibility Analysis for Industrial Vehicle Navigation
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Solution Overview
Problem
Industrial vehicles face challenges in navigation due to occluded features, which prevent accurate localization and increase processing time, as existing systems struggle to differentiate between visible and occluded environmental features.
Innovation Solution
The implementation of an Environmental Based Localization (EBL) sensor system that determines the visibility of features by analyzing a feature set and occlusion set associated with an industrial facility, using processors to classify detectable features and navigate around occluded ones, thereby improving navigation accuracy and efficiency.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Measurement precision
If sensors detect all features in the environment for localization, then localization accuracy may improve, but processing time increases and occluded features cause inaccurate results
Solution Approach 1:
The system performs preliminary occlusion analysis by determining occlusion paths between the sensor and each feature, and identifying occluding objects before the localization process. This pre-processing step filters out occluded features in advance, so that only visible features are used for localization, thereby preventing wasted processing time on invalid features while maintaining accurate localization results.
2Reliability
If sensors detect all features in the environment for localization, then more features are available for positioning, but occluded features produce inaccurate localization results
Solution Approach 1:
The system extracts and removes occluded features from the set of detectable features by performing occlusion analysis. It determines whether each feature is occluded by checking if an occlusion path exists between the sensor and the feature, and if so, whether any occluding object intersects this path. By taking out only the visible, unoccluded features, the system ensures that localization is performed exclusively on reliable features, thereby improving both localization reliability and accuracy.
3Adaptability or versatility
If the system processes all detectable features for navigation, then comprehensive environmental awareness is achieved, but processing complexity and time increase
Solution Approach 1:
The system performs preliminary occlusion analysis to pre-identify which features are visible and which are occluded before the navigation process begins. By determining occlusion paths and checking for intersections with occluding objects in advance, the system creates a filtered set of valid features for navigation. This reduces processing complexity during actual navigation operations while maintaining comprehensive environmental awareness of both visible and occluded features.
Data Source
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AI summary
According to the embodiments described herein, an industrial vehicle can include an Environmental Based Localization (EBL) sensor communicatively coupled to one or more processors. The EBL sensor can detect objects within a field of view. The one or more processors execute machine readable instructions to access a feature set and an occlusion set that are associated with an industrial facility. An occlusion path that intersects a detectable occlusion of the occlusion set and the sensor origin of the EBL sensor can be detemiined. A feature intersection of the occlusion path can be determined. A detectable feature can be classified as an occluded detectable feature based at least in part upon location of the feature intersection. The industrial vehicle can be navigated through the industrial facility utilizing the feature set exclusive of the occluded detectable feature.