Agricultural Machine Steering Resumption for Swath Path Continuity
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Solution Overview
Problem
Agricultural machines with automatic steering functions face challenges in maintaining uniform bale formation due to manual adjustments, which often result in the cancellation of the automatic steering, leading to inefficiencies and increased time in fine-tuning the traveling path.
Innovation Solution
The agricultural machine is designed to continue automatic steering even during manual adjustments within a predetermined work continuation width, using modules to determine and resume the optimal traveling path based on current position, direction, distance, and angular velocity, while allowing cancellation during rapid steering operations, and incorporating a Farm Management Information System for accurate swath positioning.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Manufacturing precision
If manual operation is performed to adjust the traveling path for fine-tuning bale uniformity, then bale uniformity is improved, but the automatic steering function is canceled requiring time-consuming reactivation
Solution Approach 1:
The automatic steering function is designed to continue executing during manual operations without being canceled. The control unit maintains the automatic steering state even when the operator performs manual steering adjustments, allowing the system to resume automatically after the manual operation without requiring reactivation. This ensures continuous useful action while allowing necessary manual interventions for fine-tuning bale uniformity.
2Ease of operation
If automatic steering is always canceled during manual steering operation, then operator control is prioritized, but the system becomes complicated and time-consuming to reactivate
Solution Approach 1:
The steering control system dynamically adapts its behavior based on the operational context. The control unit detects whether a manual steering operation is intended for obstacle avoidance or for fine-tuning the traveling path. Based on this detection, the system either temporarily suspends or continues the automatic steering function, providing responsive operator control when needed while maintaining automation continuity for routine adjustments.
3Reliability
If the automatic steering function is resumed after manual operation, then the system returns to optimal path, but the resuming process requires complex path determination
Solution Approach 1:
The control unit continuously monitors steering wheel operation parameters such as angular velocity and operation duration. When a manual operation ends, the system uses this feedback information to automatically determine whether to resume automatic steering and how to adjust the traveling path. This feedback mechanism simplifies the resumption process by using real-time operational data rather than complex pre-programmed path determination algorithms.
Data Source
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AI summary
An agricultural machine (30) is provided, which includes a swath information acquiring module (101), a first determining module (102) configured to determine a traveling path of an automatic operation based on a position of a swath, a setting module (103) configured to set a work continuation width based on the traveling path, a second determining module (102) configured to determine, when there is a manual operation by a worker during the automatic operation, whether the agricultural machine during the manual operation is within the work continuation width, and an executing module (161) configured to execute the automatic operation. The executing module resumes the agricultural machine to the traveling path after a termination of the manual operation and continues the automatic operation when the agricultural machine is within the work continuation width, and cancels the automatic operation at a time when the agricultural machine is determined to be not within the work continuation width.