Query: Sweeping robot

title: Reconfiguration During Locomotion by Pavement Sweeping Robot With Feedback Control From Vision System
abstract: Routine cleaning the pavement is an essential requirement to maintain a sustainable environment for social life. The different width and type of pavements raise the challenges for autonomous vehicles with fixed shape to operate effectively. In this paper, we introduce the vision based reconfiguration of self reconfigurable pavement sweeping robot called Panthera, which can adjust its frame width to ease the cleaning tasks to become friendly with different pavement geometry. The expansion and compression operations of the Panthera width are implemented by rotating one high torque motor connecting with the lead screw rod to change the opening angle of linkage hinges. The Panthera cleaning and locomotion operations are synchronized with changing the robot width according to the output of detected pavement width. To this end, the segmented pavement leveraged on the masked based deep convolutional neural network (DCNN) is used as input for the proposed closed loop feedback control method, enabling the robot to adjust the requirement of changing the width during locomotion accurately. The proposed PID scheme takes into account the robot kinematic design with the flexibility of width changing modes. The experiments were carried out in real environments demonstrated the autonomous reconfiguration robot width with various locomotion scenarios on pavements of varying width.

title: Path Planning of a Sweeping Robot Based on Path Estimation of a Curling Stone Using Sensor Fusion
abstract: In this paper, we proposed an enhanced path planning strategy for sweeper robots, which were created for the curling Olympic games. The main task for the multi robot system is to clean the ice surface making a smooth path for a curling stone. The sweeping robots should have a motion planning on how to follow the curling stone slide and to prevent any collisions. In order to find the next position of the sweeping robot, it needs to establish the current position and to compute the next position of the curling stone. The initial and goal points of the sweeping robots are found and set up based on the simulation results from the main server. While the curling stone moves, the sweeping robots measure its position and adjust their motions according to the stone position trajectory. If the distance between the current and the next positions of a curling stone exceeds the threshold value, the sweeping robots should activate the sweeping mechanism preventing collisions with the stone. Since the estimation of the sweeping robot motion solely depends on the stone's trajectory, the accumulation of errors is undesirable. Thus, the stone trajectory should be recalculated in a certain time step using the trend adjusted exponential smoothing method. Then, the formation of the sweeping robot system can be calibrated according to the stone path computation. The obtained experimental results proved the efficiency of the proposed path planning method.

title: Reconfigurable Pavement Sweeping Robot and Pedestrian Cohabitant Framework by Vision Techniques
abstract: The periodic cleaning pavement is a requirement for a clean environment in urban areas. The robot named Panthera introduced in this paper has the ability to change the width of the frame to help the cleaning tasks become suitable for different pavement types and friendly with the activities of the pedestrian. The Panthera cleaning operations which allow pedestrian walks freely on the pavement is modeled as a pedestrian robot cohabitant framework. To this end, the mask based deep convolutional neural network (DCNN) is used to archive segmented label maps of pedestrians in color image, then the distance from detected objects to the robot is estimated and tracked by averaging filtered depth values in the corresponding region in the refined depth image. The width and the distance from the robot to the approaching pedestrians are used to adjust the robot width. The enlarging and squeezing operations of the Panthera width are conducted by rotating one motor to change the length of the lead screw rod and the angle linkage hinges from the information of encoders sensors. The experiments carried out on real environments demonstrated the autonomous avoiding pedestrians ability by the kinematic model of Panthera.

title: A Path Planning Algorithm for Sweeping Robot Based on Improved Neural Network
abstract: This paper plans to solve the problem of the lacks of traditional path planning algorithm in self learning and the disadvantages in local path planning. We propose a path planning algorithm for sweeping robots based on improved neural network. It is aimed to provide a collision free planning route for robots in an unknown environment. This algorithm is based on the neural network algorithm, which concludes a four layer structure of network, and designs the energy function as the evaluation function of the network. First I need to find the extreme value of the energy function, and then I need to adjust the motion based on the path points, next, the robot completes the path planning task. The effectiveness of the method is proved by simulation experiments.

title: Indoor Positioning and Path Planning Platform for iRobot Create 2 Sweeping Robot
abstract: A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T Article history: Received:19 December, 2018 Accepted:25 May, 2019 Online: 18 June, 2019 Many robots have been proposed for smart applications in recent years However, while these robots have good ability to move between fixed points separated by short distances, they perform less well when required to navigate complex interior spaces with an irregular layout and multiple obstacles due to their relatively crude positioning and path control capabilities. Accordingly, the present study proposes an integrated system consisting of a Raspberry Pi development platform, various sensor devices and iBeacon technology to facilitate the path control, indoor positioning, and obstacle avoidance of a programmable iRobot Create 2 sweeping robot. The capabilities of the proposed system and its various components are investigated by means of practical experiments and numerical simulations. In general, the results confirm that the proposed integrated system provides a viable platform for the future development of sophisticated indoor robots for smart indoor applications.

title: Side Slip Angle Estimation using One Caster Steering Moment of the Sweeping Robot for Curling
abstract: The side slip angle is an important motion state for stable driving in mobile platform, and commercial sensors for the side slip angle measurement are expensive. In this paper, a side slip angle estimator is introduced to be utilized in the sweeping robot. Curling robot consist of several mobile robots which includes the sweeping robot as well as skip robot and throwing robot. To estimate the side slip angle, a state observer is developed which requires the lateral force calculated by using the steering moment of the sweeping robot. Considering the mechanical structure of the sweeping robot, the principle of bending moment analysis with the nodal hinged constrain beam is applied to define the relationship between the lateral force and steering moment. This approach is different with the conventional method which is based on the cornering stiffness and the direct lateral force sensor measurement. Furthermore, the lateral velocity, which is obtained from the camera attached in the skip robot, is also utilized in the state observer based estimator. The simulation and experimental results prove the defined relationship between lateral force and the steering moment and verify the proposed estimation algorithm.

title: Panthera: Design of a Reconfigurable Pavement Sweeping Robot
abstract: The pavement cleaning is essential to maintain urban hygiene and keep the long stretch of pavements spick and span. This paper reports on the development of novel reconfigurable pavement cleaning robot named Panthera. Reconfiguration in Panthera is gained by the expansion and contraction of the body frame using a single lead screw shaft and linkages mechanism. It gives the capability to reshape itself based on factors like pavement width and pedestrian density. The independent steering action is derived using two in wheels motors for each steering axis. This imparts the flexibility in motion and make system omnidirectional and allows the convenient movement of the robot in any direction along the pavement. It is powered using onboard batteries that generate lesser noise compared to the existing solution powered with gasoline. The modeling and steering kinematics is presented along with experimental results of the path followed and discussion supporting the robot's capability.

title: The Cleaning Coverage Test System of Sweeping Robot
abstract: A cleaning coverage test system based on LabVIEW is presented in this paper, aiming at the uneven cleaning efficiency of sweeping robots on the market. First, the camera is used to capture the test site of the sweeping robot, the resulting image is processed, then the template image is converted into cluster array and the real time image is matched. The feature is extracted to obtain the position of the sweeping robot, loop to track the path of the sweeping robot, and the coverage of the sweeping robot for this area is calculated.

title: Path Planning Method of Sweeping Robot Based on Beacon Positioning
abstract: At present1, path planning technology is one of the core contents of sweeping robot research. In order to avoid problems such as low coverage, high repetition rate and long cleaning time, the robot take images of the beacon with camera, then get a coordinate value for self localization. A full coverage path planning method that improves positioning accuracy. Using this path planning method can not only avoid the above various defects, but also be widely applied in fields other than the sweeping robot.

title: Research on the image of sweeping robot based on the Artificial Neural Network
abstract: Based on the theory of Artificial Neural Network and Kansei Engineering, the image of sweeping robots are formed using the content analysis method, and propose four kinds of sweeping robot as the experimental samples, which have a strong influence on the market. The image questionnaires are compiled by the semantic differences methods. 200 office workers, half men and half women, are chose as the survey respondents. And use SPSS statistical software for data analysis. Afterwards, the BP Artificial Neural Network model is established by Matlab based on the questionnaire results, and the optimized design scheme with image feature combination for sweeping robot products is generated on the basis of BP Artificial Neural Network model. This study construct the emotional demands on the image level, and carry out experiments and statistical analysis, which lays a solid foundation for the study of product image in theory and approach.