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Subject: 
Re: Autonomous Robot
Newsgroups: 
lugnet.robotics
Date: 
Thu, 3 Aug 2000 14:56:49 GMT
Viewed: 
1001 times
  
I explored the use of a single rotation sensor to make a robot drive
straight here:

http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/a/network/2000/05/22/LegoMindstorms.html

You can use a differential to take the difference of the two motors'
output; if the motors are not moving at the same speed, you'll see some
movement on the rotation sensor.

My conclusion was that dead reckoning alone is not enough--you should
periodically calibrate with another navigation technique, like using
landmarks.

Jonathan

Juergen Stuber wrote:

Hi Mario, Mauro,

"Mario Ferrari" <mario.ferrari@edis.it> writes:

Some free thoughts about this topic:

1) With a differential drive setup, you could use two rotation sensors both
for navigation between landmarks, and for collision detection: when the
wheels are supposed to rotate (motor on) but don't, you know you are against
an obstacle. Very simple but effective. You now can use the third sensor
port for a light sensor bound to landmark detection.

I tried to get away with a single rotation sensor on a
differential drive (put it on one of the output), assuming
that I one motor is not moving I could deduce total
movement.  Unfortunately the turning motor drifts slightly
on forward/backward motion, so the thing is not going
straight.

2) A grid of tape on the floor works very well as
artificial landmark. Use different color for the
horizontal and vertical lines, so you're sure of what kind
of line you crossed.

I have a natural landmark in the form of a checkered kitchen
floor, I'd like to try that for navigation.  It's a little
more complicated I guess.

3) A different landmarking approach could be using a laser beam to query
some base stations (if you're open to use a non-Lego laser pointer). The
idea is you have a roating laser pointer connected to a motor and a rotation
sensor (multiplied to increase resolution). When the robot wants to
calculate its position, it stops and starts slowly rotating the laser beam.
The base stations have a light sensor positioned at the same height of the
laser beam. When the light sensor gets hit by the laser light, it reads
almost 100% and the base station transmit an IR message to say "got it".

Almost 100% is an understatement, a laser really saturates a
light sensor.  The problem is hitting it in the first place,
I found that next to impossible to achieve.  I'd rather go
for some strobe lights (good for identification by rhythm),
or maybe halogene lights, with the light sensor on the robot
like scanbot in Dave Baum's book.  I also tried candles
once, but they are to dim, they can be seen only from a
short distance, on the order of 10cm.

Jürgen

--
Jürgen Stuber <stuber@loria.fr>
http://www.loria.fr/~stuber/



Message is in Reply To:
  Re: Autonomous Robot
 
Hi Mario, Mauro, (...) I tried to get away with a single rotation sensor on a differential drive (put it on one of the output), assuming that I one motor is not moving I could deduce total movement. Unfortunately the turning motor drifts slightly on (...) (24 years ago, 3-Aug-00, to lugnet.robotics)

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