Mobile Robot Tilt Threshold Adaptation for Hazard Area Navigation
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Solution Overview
Problem
Mobile robots face challenges in maximizing coverage while minimizing the risk of hazards, such as getting stuck or experiencing over-tilt events, as they navigate diverse environments with varying obstacles.
Innovation Solution
The method involves storing an environment map and hazard area data on the robot's memory, reducing the tilt threshold in areas where hazards have been encountered, and updating this data based on new hazards, allowing the robot to navigate cautiously in known hazard areas while maintaining coverage by adjusting its behavior dynamically.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Productivity
If the mobile robot increases its manoeuvrability to maximize coverage, then the robot can navigate over more obstacles and clean more floor surface, but the risk of encountering hazards such as getting stuck or overturning increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies local quality by implementing location-specific tilt thresholds based on hazard history. The robot maintains a normal tilt threshold in safe areas to maximize maneuverability and coverage, but automatically reduces the tilt threshold when navigating through previously identified hazard areas. This spatially varying control parameter allows the robot to be aggressive in safe zones while cautious in dangerous zones, resolving the contradiction between coverage and hazard risk.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent employs preliminary action by pre-mapping hazard areas during initial robot operations and storing this hazard history in memory. Before the robot encounters actual hazards, the system has already identified problematic locations and prepared reduced tilt thresholds for those specific areas. This proactive approach allows the robot to anticipate and avoid hazards before they occur, maintaining reliability while preserving productivity.
2Reliability
If the mobile robot reduces the tilt threshold to avoid hazards, then the robot can navigate more cautiously and reduce hazard risk, but the coverage and maneuverability over obstacles decrease
Solution Approach 1:
The system implements local quality by making the tilt threshold a location-dependent parameter rather than a global constant. The robot maintains high tilt thresholds (aggressive maneuvering) in safe areas to maximize coverage, while automatically reducing the tilt threshold only in previously identified hazard areas. This selective application of caution preserves overall productivity while ensuring safety in dangerous locations.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent applies dynamics by making the tilt threshold adaptive and changeable based on the robot's current location and hazard history. Rather than using a fixed conservative threshold that would limit coverage, the system dynamically adjusts the threshold in real-time: high in safe areas, low in hazard areas. This dynamic adjustment allows the robot to optimize both coverage and hazard avoidance simultaneously.
Data Source
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AI summary
A method of controlling a mobile robot (50) capable of carrying out an operation within an environment, the method comprising: storing an environment map in a memory, the environment map including data to enable the robot to navigate the environment; further storing in the memory data corresponding to one or more hazard areas (60) encountered by the mobile robot during previous operations; and reducing a tilt threshold of the robot when the mobile robot is navigating (70) within an area (60) of the environment that corresponds to a previously encountered hazard area.