Polar Docking Maps for Accurate Vessel Maneuvering in Crowded Marinas
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Solution Overview
Problem
Conventional automated directional control systems for vehicles, including planes and watercraft, are unreliable and inaccurate for docking and parking, especially in crowded conditions and with external disturbances like wind or water currents, due to the need for expensive and difficult-to-retrofit sensors.
Innovation Solution
A docking assist system that includes a logic device, sensors, actuators, and user interfaces to determine and provide control signals for navigation, using perimeter ranging data to create polar maps and display views for maneuverability, enabling more accurate and reliable autonomous or assisted docking.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Measurement precision
If conventional automated directional control systems use expensive and difficult-to-retrofit sensors, then measurement precision may be improved, but device complexity and ease of manufacture deteriorate
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies universality by using a camera system that serves multiple functions: it captures images for docking assistance, provides perimeter awareness, and enables polar map generation. This multi-functional approach eliminates the need for specialized expensive sensors while maintaining high measurement precision for docking operations.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent creates a polar map which is a copied representation of the physical environment around the watercraft. This digital copy allows the system to process spatial information without requiring complex physical sensors, transforming visual data into a usable navigation model that achieves high docking accuracy.
2Reliability
If conventional systems use specialized sensors for docking, then reliability may improve, but ease of operation and ease of repair worsen
Solution Approach 1:
The system performs self-service by automatically generating polar maps and computing docking trajectories without requiring complex manual configuration or specialized sensor calibration. The camera-based approach allows standard imaging equipment to self-adjust and provide reliable docking assistance through automated image processing algorithms.
3Reliability
If conventional systems lack environmental disturbance compensation, then device complexity remains low, but reliability under external disturbances deteriorates
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements feedback by continuously capturing images during the docking maneuver, generating updated polar maps, and adjusting the trajectory in real-time. This closed-loop control compensates for environmental disturbances such as wind and water currents, maintaining high reliability without requiring complex predictive models or additional specialized sensors.
Data Source
AI summary
Techniques are disclosed for systems and methods to provide docking assist and/or general navigation for mobile structures. A docking assist or navigation control system includes a logic device, a perimeter ranging sensor, one or more actuators/controllers, and modules to interface with users, sensors, actuators, and/or other elements of a mobile structure. The logic device is configured to receive perimeter sensor data from the perimeter ranging system. The logic device determines a polar height map based on the received perimeter sensor data and a polar non-water object map and/or a polar vessel perimeter map based on the polar non-water object map. The logic device then generates a display view and/or determines navigation control signals based, at least in part, on the polar maps. Control signals may be displayed to a user and/or used to adjust a steering actuator, a propulsion system thrust, and/or other operational systems of the mobile structure.