GNSS Steering Axle Control for Precise Tractor Track Following
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing agricultural vehicle steering systems, particularly those using hydraulic actuation, face challenges in maintaining accurate guidance on uneven terrain, especially with wider working widths, leading to unreliable functionality and implement drift on slopes.
Innovation Solution
The system employs a precisely guided steering axle with a GNSS position sensor, allowing the vehicle to follow a predetermined guide track, eliminating the need for rear axle guidance and costly sliding frames, by using a telescopic steering cylinder and hydraulic actuator controlled by a steering control unit that adjusts based on real-time position data compared to target data.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Measurement precision
If the rear axle is guided using sensor-controlled steering systems, then the tractor can follow a predefined track, but absolute precision is lost due to ground unevenness requiring constant steering corrections
Solution Approach 1:
Instead of guiding the rear axle (traditional approach), the invention guides the front steering axle along the predefined AB track. This inversion of the guidance point eliminates the accumulation of steering errors and ground unevenness effects, achieving absolute track precision without constant corrections
2Adaptability or versatility
If hydraulic actuators are used to push the three-point linkage and implement to the side, then implement position can be adjusted, but correct guidance is no longer guaranteed and reliability deteriorates at working widths of 3m and above
Solution Approach 1:
The invention extracts the guidance function from the rear axle/implement level and relocates it to the front steering axle. This separation allows the steering axle to maintain absolute track following while the implement can be independently positioned using hydraulic actuators, ensuring both guidance reliability and implement adaptability
Solution Approach 2:
The front steering axle acts as an intermediary element that receives direct guidance control and translates it into precise steering movements. This intermediary maintains the guidance accuracy while allowing independent control of the implement position through the three-point linkage
3Adaptability or versatility
If a sliding frame is used to accommodate attachments, then adaptability is improved, but system complexity and cost increase
Solution Approach 1:
The invention extracts the guidance function from the attachment/implement level and places it at the steering axle. This eliminates the need for complex sliding frames to maintain guidance accuracy, as the steering axle itself becomes the reference point for all attachments
Applied Scientific Principles
This section explains which scientific principles are used to turn an abstract innovation direction into a practical engineering solution.
Function Achieved in This Case
This approach enhances steering accuracy and reliability, ensuring precise adherence to the guide track even on uneven terrain and slopes, without requiring costly sliding frames and improves the overall precision of agricultural tillage operations.
Implementation Method 1
a position sensor such as a GNSS receiver (GNSS: Global Navigation Satellite System)
Data Source
Figure 1
AI summary
The invention relates to a land vehicle, in particular an agricultural vehicle such as a tractor or steerable implement, which has: - a steering axle on which one or more wheels, pivotable for steering, are attached, - a linear drive coupled to the wheel(s), which can be actuated via an actuator for pivoting and steering the wheel(s), - a steering control unit connected to the actuator and a position sensor, wherein actual position data relating to the land vehicle are transmitted or can be transmitted via the position sensor unit to the steering control unit in order to compare predefined or predefined target position data for the land vehicle with the actual position data and to compensate for any target-actual difference by a corresponding change in the vehicle's direction of travel, wherein - the actual position data from the position sensor unit are related to or can be related to the steering axle of the land vehicle.and - the corresponding change in the vehicle's direction of travel is effected by the linear drive being actuated or actuated via the actuator by the steering control depending on a deviation of the steering axle's actual position data from the land vehicle's target position data, - and this actuation corresponds to the target-actual difference between the target position data for the land vehicle and the actual position data related to its steering axle and can be converted into or implemented in a pivoting of the wheel(s) of its steering axle to maintain the target position data.