Towards motor control adjustment with inertial sensor measurements for small differential drive robots
- Publication Type
- Contribution to conference
- Authors
- David Reiser; Marvin Hubl; Hans W. Griepentrog
- Year of publication
- 2018
- Published in
- Bornimer Agrartechnische Berichte Heft 101
- Editor
- Leibniz - Institut für Agrartechnik und Bioökonomie e.V. (ATB)
- Pubisher
- Leibniz - Institut für Agrartechnik und Bioökonomie e .V , Potsdamm
- Band/Volume
- 101/
- Series/labeling
- https://www.atb-potsdam.de/fileadmin/docs/Publikationen/BAB_Heft_101.pdf
- ISBN / ISSN / eISSN
- 0947-7314
- Page (from - to)
- 95-101
- Conference name
- 6th International Conference on Machine Control and Guidance
- Conference location
- Berlin
- Conference date
- 1-2.10.2018
Small robots can play an important role in saving agricultural productivity in future when they are able to navigate efficiently in a semi-structured agricultural environment. Different underground types, soil roughness and compaction levels can make it hard for these small robots to work reliably. For each environment, the control strategy must be adjusted correctly to be energy sufficient and successful. However, this requires detection of the surface characteristics and knowledge about the robot behavior. In this research, the inertial sensors of a small four-wheeled differential drive robot were used. The robot was equipped with an inertial measurement unit (IMU), encoders and an ampere meter at each of the four wheel motors. The robot was manually guided over three different surfaces: concrete, compacted sand and linoleum. The robot drove straight with constant speed and afterwards performed a headland turn, following a typical pattern for agricultural robot navigation. It was possible to detect the different surface types by analyzing the IMU and the power consumption of the motors. This could help to enhance self-control and guidance for small autonomous robots without external sensors.