Robot forklifts find their way around
Friday, March 23, 2007 at 12:37AM
Joel
The corresponding 3D point cloud view shows a man and a pallet from less than 3 m away and lower than 10 m in height from the sensor. The corresponding 3D point cloud view shows a man and a pallet from less than 3 m away and lower than 10 m in height from the sensor.The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) is developing advanced sensor-processing and modeling algorithms to help robot forklifts verify the location and orientation of pallets laden with goods.Two onboard, single-scan-line ladar devices negotiate obstacles and locate pallets. Ladar — laser detection and ranging — measures properties of reflected lasers to determine range and other information about the target. A sensor at the base of the automatic-guided vehicle (AGV) detects obstacles such as humans in the forklift's path. It also scans inside trucks to detect pallets and measure the distance between forklifts and the side of the truck.
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Article originally appeared on Joel Orr's World of Technology|CADCAM|PLM (http://joelorr.squarespace.com/).
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