JPS5962918A - Introduction control method of unattended car - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To change easily the equipment on ground and the running path, by installing a recursive reflecting mirror at a high place such as ceiling and using this reflecting light to introduce an unattended car. CONSTITUTION:Plural recursive reflecting mirrors 1 are installed at a location relating to the running path of the unattended car 2 on the ceiling. Further, a scanner of laser spot is mounted on the front part of the car 2. The light spot reflecting light reflected from the recursive reflecting mirrors 1 are received with the scanning of the scanner. Based on the reflecting light, the position and direction information of the car 2 are obtained to control the operation, running and spop. In inducing the unattended car in this way, the change in the equipment on ground and the running path are attained easily.

Description

[Detailed description of the invention] Unreleased F! No. 11 relates to a guidance control method for running/stopping, steering, etc. of an automatic guided vehicle, and proposes a guidance control method that particularly facilitates installation of ground-side equipment, change of travel route, etc.

Progress is being made in the development and practical application of automated guided vehicles that run unmanned on factory floors without relying on rails. As a conventional guidance method, the Tokubus wire method is known, in which electric wires are buried under the floor and information is obtained by imitating the electromagnetic waves caused by the current flowing through the wires. There were disadvantages such as requiring a long time, making it difficult to perform frequent maintenance and inspection, and not being able to easily change the route.There was also the problem of malfunction due to the reinforcing bars under the floor.

A simpler method is known, in which a light-reflecting tape is adhered to the floor surface and the tape is followed by the tape. F'+(r) Malfunctions due to dirt are unavoidable.

The unreleased Fll-1 was developed to solve certain problems with the conventional technology, and retroreflectors were installed on the upper side walls of the factory, on the ceiling, etc., and on the other hand, light such as laser light was installed on the transport vehicle. Equipped with a spot scanning device, the reflected light from the M'' retroreflector is detected by 41M, and based on this, guidance control such as steering, running/stopping, etc. is performed, installation of ground-side equipment, and change of travel route. The purpose of the present invention is to provide a method for guiding an automatic guided vehicle that makes it easy to perform the following tasks.

The method for guiding an automated guided vehicle according to Unreleased 1!11 is to install a retroreflector at a location higher than the travel level of the guided vehicle and associated with the route on which the guided vehicle should travel, while The conveyance vehicle is equipped with a light spot scanning device, and by scanning, the reflected light from the light spot reflected by the r'\ retroreflector is reflected by the 111, and the reflected light and the attitude of the conveyor and/or 4111' It is characterized in that it is controlled in association with the position 11 on the path.

Hereinafter, the unreleased 1 will be specifically explained based on the drawings showing the embodiments thereof.

FIG. 1d is a schematic ten-sided view of a rectangular factory, in which a tr. tHI
The T retroreflector 1 is installed so that it faces downward from the wall surface.

FIG. 2 is an elevational view taken along line II-1, 1 in FIG. The mirror 1 with J[K attached to it is used as a guide for tracing.

CI''+ Figure 3 is a plan view schematically showing the configuration of the transport vehicle 2, and Figure 4 is a pressure plane view. is drive wheel 2
W
+'e 1lillφr 23.2. (Pivotal level. Drive 11i 11 wheels 22° 12 geared motors 2
4.24 respectively at 1717 im), both motors 24
, 24 respectively run after nil, stop,
It is designed to allow steering, turning (spin coon), etc. One motor 24, 24 is mounted on the base 21, and is located so as to transmit power to the body wheels 22, 22 via a reduction gear.

A speed sensor 25 such as a tachogenerator rotation encoder is provided to detect the speed. Base 21
Above are the batteries 26, 26 for the motors 24, 24, etc., with LQ< 1liJI, and the laser f: raw equipment i"e 2
7. Control circuit 28 and left and right motor drive 1υJ Irl
It is equipped with Raku29. These devices are described below as a scanning device; except for the 30 light emitting and receiving ends, a protective cover 2 o is used.

``IH1'' is placed in the ``-'', and the ``I'' is placed in the ``-''.

They are provided at a total of four locations between the center bodies in the front-rear direction and the left-right direction on the two side walls of the three-scanning device protective cover 2 ( ), and the 114 configurations of each are completely the same.

FIG. 5 is a schematic diagram of the structure of the scanning device 3.

The laser beam emitted by the laser generator I'9'' 27 is propagated to the valley scanning device 3 via the optical 7 eyeper 31.The optical fiber;
It is supported by a rotational pin 11llh32 on the support C, and an angle detector 33 consisting of a potentiometer and a rotary encoder is connected to this support 1li1132 for detecting the rotational angle. A position closer to the end of 'irJ than the support point by this rotation support shaft 32 is connected to a horizontal scanning circular motor (5) via a crank mechanism 34, and the rotation of this motor 35 causes the end of the fiber 31 to be The support shaft 32
Shake around! I'm trying to make it 1d1.

- The motor 35, corner] W detector 33, etc. mentioned above are in the housing 36.
Incidentally, it is stored and visible, and the optical fiber 31
The terminal is outside the casing.

The solo spot should be placed on the support shaft 32 so that it faces diagonally upward with an appropriate elevation angle. Crank mechanism 34 and 3! fj conclude.

A light receiving section 39 using a ring-shaped diode array or the like is attached to the terminal of the optical fiber 31, which captures the reflected light of the light spot and outputs a photoelectrically converted value to the control circuit 28. Also, the output of the angle detector 33 is il+l
The feed is fed to the J feed 1 circuit 28.

Next, the control to be performed by the 1i1J control M'S 28 will be explained. First, let's talk about the case where the traveling route is to go straight.The motor of the front scanning device 3;
Move the IM to support the terminal part of the optical fiber 311lIll13
Rock it twice. I'f1111 of optical fiber 31
The light spot of the laser exiting the end is located on the side wall 12 in the direction of projection.
] 181 To scan horizontally in a reasonable angle range,
II) Re-reflected by the mirror 1 of the tightening part and the optical fiber 3
The number of received lights at the end of t'1M of 1 exceeds 11 to ill≦39.

Now, FIG. 6 V is a plan view showing the state 1μ in this case, and shows the center line of the transport vehicle 2 (two points (indicated by t+a) lo,
It intersects with the ideal travel route 11. The control circuit 28 determines the center line l of the four general transport vehicle 2 using the signal from the light receiving section 39 and the side blade from the angle detector 33. The configuration is configured to detect the angle θ between Of course, = 0.Control circuit 2
8 is a drive circuit 2 which sends a control signal to drive the left and right motors 24, 24 at unequal speeds in order to set this θ to 0.
Give to 9. For example, when the conveyance vehicle is veering to the right as shown in the figure, the right motor 24 is set relatively faster than the left motor in order to correct the steering to the left.

Now, if a sufficiently high output laser generator 27 is used, the time will be less than 1σ, but if the traveling path 11 is long, the laser beam will not reach the reflecting mirror 1, or the reflected light will not reach the light receiving part 39.
There are some things that cannot be grasped. In such a case, as shown in FIG.
b. As a result, guidance is performed using the auxiliary reflectors ta, t, and b while the vehicle is far from the reflector 1.

The control circuit 28 determines the travel route 11 based on separately provided information.
Control is performed to position and stop at intersection points such as . FIG. 8 illustrates the principle of stopping at the intersection of route 11 and route 12 perpendicular to it! It is an Ij diagram. Control 1 circuit 28
The output of the speed sensor 25 is given to the vehicle, thereby monitoring the travel distance 6. When it is detected that the intersection point to be stopped is approached based on this distance and the above information, the control device 1 circuit 28i starts the scanning device fi2:3 on either the left or right side (in the illustrated example, the right side), Passing through the center, is the center line of 4s.■112/. A reference line m perpendicular to the reference line m. and this scanning device 3 and the reflecting mirror 1 (1) on the path 12 side.
The angle ψ formed by the straight line m1 connecting the two points is detected based on the reflected light detection signal from the reflecting mirror 1d and the signal from the angle detector 33. This detection itself is performed in exactly the same way as θ detection, but in the case of stop control, when the motor 24 reaches ψ-0,
, 24-1 d). In addition, if you want to set the conveyance speed to high speed and achieve high stopping accuracy of +1, decelerate when ψ becomes smaller than the predetermined value.
If it is stopped at ψ=0, it is possible to add n to the influence of inertia. Furthermore, to stop at a point other than an intersection point, it is only necessary to stop the motor drive by comparing the monitored travel distance N with the one-city distance information inputted as a command to the stop position.

Next, after being positioned and stopped as described above, a spin turn (turning on the spot) is performed when the traveling direction is changed by 90 degrees, but this is done by driving the left and right motors 24, 24 to rotate in the forward and reverse directions. The control circuit 28 supplies the drive circuit 29 with a control signal for causing the rotation as described above based on separately provided information. Then, by scanning device 3 on the front of the aircraft, θ=
0 (here, the new target reflecting mirror 1d is used as a reference).'' Two series of rotational movements IIσJ are performed.

FIG. 9 shows an example of a travel route in the case of moving from a starting point other than the base-like travel route defined by the reflecting mirror to the same destination point. The transfer device 13 at the starting point and the transfer device 14 at the destination point have the above-mentioned violations: 噸1 e,
1e is fixed so that its optical axis is perpendicular to the nearest travel route in plan view. The control circuit 28 uses the reflection Q1e of the starting point transfer device 13 and the scanning device 3 on the rear side of the aircraft to perform a straight flight 1. Stopping at a point other than the intersection, spin turn N12 reflection @1, and straight R2, turning N2 using the scanning device 3 on the aircraft 1t1 side. Go straight 1<3. Turn N3°, go straight R4, stop at a point other than the intersection, spin turn N4, and go straight using the reflector 1e of the transfer device 14 at the destination point; When guiding the vehicle, the only information that needs to be provided is the mileage information for going straight, and the direction for turning. This is because the stopping position can be determined simply by providing information on the straight travel distance.

In the case of the above-mentioned method J, the ground equipment for visiting No. 17 is only a reflector, so the installation surface is easy, and it is easy to change the route. Furthermore, since it is not installed on the floor, there will be no problems caused by other cars Q~, 11 running, etc. There is a strong desire for safety in automatic guided vehicles, but if reflected light is not captured for a predetermined period of time, 5I: If the vehicle is brought to a sudden stop, 1d nr + vehicle + l1iIl, person.

The present invention has excellent effects, such as being able to create a system that is 11" safer without colliding with obstacles. In the above embodiment, scanning devices were provided on all four sides of the fuselage, but as understood from the above description, the 6i
7. It is sufficient to provide it on each of the rear and left and right sides. The device 1°7t may be configured to widen the light spot by rotating a mirror. Further, in the above embodiment, the travel routes are orthogonal and intersect, but they may also be oblique and intersect, and the software of the control circuit 28 can simply handle Mf.

[Brief explanation of the drawings] The drawings show an example of the construction completed in January, and Figure 1 shows the driving route and the direction of travel. A plane layout diagram of the J-1 mirror, Fig. 2 is an elevational view taken along the [1-rJ line in Fig. 1, Fig. 3 is a plan view schematically showing the configuration of the 4ψ vehicle, and Fig. 4 is a front view of the same. , FIG. 5 shows the scanning device [P'? FIG. 6 is a schematic diagram of the configuration. FIGS. 7 and 8 are 1101 illustrations, and FIG. 9 is a plan pattern diagram showing an example of a moving route. l...Reflector 2...Transportation vehicle 3...Scanning device 24
...Morph 27...Laser generator 28...Control circuit 1 Figure 2 Figure 3 3 Design Zl-Also

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. In a method for guiding the travel of an automated guided vehicle, a retroreflector 11 is provided at a position 11'C at a location higher than the travel level of the guided vehicle and associated with the route on which the guided vehicle is to travel, The transport vehicle is equipped with a light spot scanning device, and by scanning, the light spot reflected by the retroreflector is detected by 41β, and the reflected light and the attitude of the transport vehicle and/or the position on the route of the transport vehicle are determined. A method for guiding and controlling an automatic guided vehicle, characterized in that the following is controlled in association with the following.