Robotic vacuum cleaner with side brush moving in spiral pattern
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Solution Overview
Problem
Conventional robotic vacuum cleaners struggle to effectively clean corners and edges due to their circular shape, often leaving debris behind as they push it off the cleaning pattern during back-and-forth strokes, necessitating improved navigation and cleaning strategies.
Innovation Solution
A robotic cleaning device with a 3D sensor system and processing unit that generates a spiral cleaning pattern, allowing the device to move inward from the periphery, ensuring the brush remains on the outer side and effectively captures debris, while adapting to complex layouts and obstacles.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Ease of operation
If a circular-shaped main body is used for easy control and rotation, then the robotic vacuum cleaner can rotate 180° and go back easily, but it cannot move into corners or close enough to walls for effective cleaning
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies asymmetry by changing the main body shape from circular to rectangular with a protruding front end. This asymmetric design allows the robot to reach into corners and along walls that circular designs cannot access, directly improving cleaning effectiveness in previously unreachable areas while maintaining controllability
2Productivity
If a rectangular-shaped front end is used to reach into corners, then the robotic vacuum cleaner can access edges and corners better, but the shape becomes more complex and may get stuck
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies segmentation by dividing the cleaning function into two parts: the rectangular main body for general area cleaning and the separate protruding front end with side brushes for corner and edge cleaning. This segmentation allows the robot to maintain a relatively simple overall shape while adding specialized cleaning capability for corners without significantly increasing complexity
3Adaptability or versatility
If side brush is positioned on one side of the opening, then the cleaning movement can be adapted, but debris is pushed off the actual cleaning pattern during back-and-forth movement
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies dynamics by making the cleaning pattern adaptive rather than fixed. The spiral cleaning patterns are dynamically adjusted based on the side brush position and robot orientation. This dynamic adaptation ensures that the spiral path always positions the side brush effectively to engage debris, maintaining cleaning effectiveness regardless of the brush's lateral position
Data Source
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AI summary
A robotic cleaning device comprising a main body (2A, 2B), an opening (10) arranged in a bottom side of the main body for removing debris from an area (28A, 28B, 28C, 28D, 28E, 28F) to be cleaned, a brush (16) arranged adjacent to the opening (10) and a propulsion system (8) configured to move the robotic cleaning device across the area (28A, 28B, 28C, 28D, 28E, 28F). The robotic cleaning device may further comprise a positioning system (4) comprising an obstacle detecting device configured to detect obstacles and a processing unit (20), the obstacle detecting device being configured to record positional data, wherein the processing unit (20) is configured to generate a cleaning pattern (26A, 26B, 26C, 26D, 26E, 26F) from said positional data, said cleaning pattern (26A, 26B, 26C, 26D, 26E, 26F) comprising at least one spiral pattern (27A, 27B, 27C, 27D, 27E) having an outer periphery (30A, 30B, 30C, 30D, 30E), said spiral pattern (27A, 27B, 27C, 27D, 27E, 27F) being arranged so that, during the cleaning, the robotic cleaning device spirals itself inwards from the outer periphery (30A, 30B, 30C, 30D, 30E) towards a centre of the spiral pattern (27A, 27B, 27C, 27D, 27E, 27F), whereby the brush (16) is arranged to face the outer periphery (30A, 30B, 30C, 30D, 30E), while the robotic cleaning device (1) follows the spiral pattern (27A, 27B, 27C, 27D, 27E, 27F).