Method for autonomous processing of floor surfaces
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing mobile, self-propelled floor cleaning appliances, such as suction robots, face challenges in navigating around obstacles like furniture and door thresholds, leading to potential damage and stuck situations, which can result in incomplete cleaning and user intervention.
Innovation Solution
The method involves an exploratory tour to create a surroundings map, detecting obstacles, and classifying them as passable or not passable based on their position, allowing the appliance to drive over passable obstacles and around non-passable ones, thereby avoiding damage and stuck situations.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Productivity
If the suction robot attempts to overcome obstacles by driving over them, then it can continue cleaning without user intervention, but it may cause damage to obstacles or become stuck
Solution Approach 1:
The suction robot performs an exploratory tour before the actual cleaning task to create a surroundings map. During this preliminary action, it detects and classifies obstacles as passable or not passable based on their position in the map. This preliminary classification allows the robot to plan its cleaning path to avoid damaging obstacles while maintaining cleaning productivity.
2Productivity
If the suction robot drives over narrow-profile thresholds, then it can maintain cleaning continuity, but it risks becoming stuck and causing noise
Solution Approach 1:
During the exploratory tour, the robot detects thresholds and narrow-profile obstacles, classifies them as not passable, and records their positions in the surroundings map. Before the cleaning task begins, the robot uses this pre-acquired information to plan a cleaning path that avoids these obstacles, thereby maintaining cleaning continuity without the harmful effects of noise and entrapment.
3Difficulty of detecting and measuring
If the suction robot uses bumper sensors to detect obstacles, then it can identify obstacles in its path, but it reacts too late to avoid damage
Solution Approach 1:
The robot performs an exploratory tour before the cleaning task to detect and map all obstacles in advance. This preliminary detection creates a complete surroundings map that includes obstacle positions, types, and passability classifications. During the actual cleaning task, the robot refers to this pre-created map to navigate around obstacles, eliminating the need for late reactive detection and avoiding damage entirely.
Solution Approach 2:
The robot uses sensor feedback during the exploratory tour to build and update the surroundings map. The detection facility continuously provides information about obstacles, which is processed and stored in the map data structure. This feedback mechanism allows the robot to accumulate knowledge about the environment before the cleaning task, enabling proactive obstacle avoidance rather than reactive responses.
Data Source
AI summary
A method for autonomous processing of floor surfaces by way of a mobile, self-driving device, in particular a floor cleaning device such as a suction robot and/or sweeping and/or mopping robot. The method includes the following steps: performing an exploration travel of the mobile, self-driving device in a proposed floor processing region for establishing a surroundings map, detecting obstacles by a detection device, classifying the obstacles as passable or impassable, and traveling over an obstacle classified as passable and/or traveling around an obstacle classified as impassable. There is also described a mobile, self-driving device that is suitable for carrying out such a method.