Robot Cleaner Wheel Control for Floor Groove Navigation
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Solution Overview
Problem
Robot cleaners often get hindered by obstacles such as grooves or recesses on the floor, which can prevent them from rotating and moving normally, requiring additional support wheels to navigate these patterns effectively.
Innovation Solution
A robot cleaner equipped with a control unit that uses obstacle sensors to detect and map the floor pattern, limiting the driving of its wheels to avoid hindrance by preset patterns, allowing it to travel freely over irregular surfaces like grooves or steps.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If a support wheel is added near the main wheel to prevent hindrance by grooves, then the robot cleaner can pass through grooves without being hindered, but the device complexity increases due to additional components
Solution Approach 1:
The patent replaces the mechanical support wheel system with a control-based system. The control unit detects groove patterns using obstacle sensors and automatically adjusts main wheel driving to avoid getting hindered, eliminating the need for additional support wheels while maintaining the ability to pass through grooves
Solution Approach 2:
The robot cleaner uses its own main wheels in a controlled manner to navigate grooves. The control unit enables the main wheels to perform specific driving patterns (such as alternating rotation or differential speed control) that allow the robot to clear grooves without requiring separate support wheels
2Productivity
If the robot cleaner rotates on a preset pattern to perform cleaning, then cleaning coverage is improved, but the driving wheels may be hindered by the pattern causing rotation failure
Solution Approach 1:
The control unit performs preliminary detection of groove patterns using obstacle sensors before the robot cleaner rotates for cleaning. By identifying groove locations in advance, the control unit can plan rotation paths that avoid groove hindrance, ensuring both cleaning coverage and rotation reliability
Data Source
AI summary
Disclosed is a robot cleaner including a main body forming an appearance, at least one driving wheel installed on a lower portion of the main body, a driving unit configured to drive the driving wheel according to an operation of a driving motor, a first obstacle sensor positioned on the lower portion of the main body and configured to sense an obstacle on the floor, and a control unit configured to, when the sensed obstacle on the floor has a preset pattern, limit driving of the at least one driving wheel such that the at least one driving wheel is not hindered by the preset pattern when the main body rotates on the preset pattern according to driving of the at least one driving wheel.