TAG LAYOUT FOR INDUSTRIAL VEHICLE OPERATION

• US 20160327952A1
• Filed: 05/06/2016
• Published: 11/10/2016
• Est. Priority Date: 05/06/2015
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: Crown Equipment Corporation
• Original Assignee: Crown Equipment Corporation
• Inventors: Walton, Daniel D., Sherman, Nicholas J.
• Application Number:
  US15/148,605
• Publication Number:
  US 20160327952A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: B66F 9/063 Automatically guided
• CPC Class Codes: E04H 5/02 Buildings or groups of buildings for industrial purposes, e.g. for power-plants or factories buildings forming part of cooling plants E04H5/10
• CPC Class Codes: G01C 21/3811 Point data, e.g. Point of Interest [POI]
• CPC Class Codes: G05D 1/0088 characterized by the autonomous decision making process, e.g. artificial intelligence, predefined behaviours using knowledge based models G06N5/00
• CPC Class Codes: G05D 1/021 specially adapted to land vehicles
• CPC Class Codes: G05D 1/0212 with means for defining a desired trajectory involving a plurality of land vehicles G05D1/0287
• CPC Class Codes: G05D 1/0223 involving speed control of the vehicle vehicle fittings for automatically controlling, i.e. preventing speed from exceeding an arbitrarily established velocity or maintaining speed at a particular velocity, as selected by the vehicle operator B60K31/00
• CPC Class Codes: G05D 1/0261 using magnetic plots
• CPC Class Codes: G05D 1/028 using a RF signal
• CPC Class Codes: G05D 1/0291 Fleet control monitoring fleets in traffic control systems for road vehicles G08G1/127, G08G1/127
• CPC Class Codes: G06K 17/0029 the arrangement being specially adapted for wireless interrogation of grouped or bundled articles tagged with wireless record carriers
• CPC Class Codes: G06K 7/10366 the interrogation device being adapted for miscellaneous applications
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/00 Administration; Management
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/087 Inventory or stock management, e.g. order filling, procurement or balancing against orders

Abstract

According to one embodiment of the present disclosure, an industrial facility is provided comprising a tag layout and at least one ingress/egress zone. The tag layout comprises at least one double row of tags. The ingress/egress zone is located outside of an area of the vehicle travel plane occupied by the aisle path and is bounded in its entirety by the double row of tags, by two or more double rows of tags, by a combination of one or more double rows of tags and one more selected facility boundaries, or by combinations thereof. The double row of tags is arranged in an n×m matrix that is configured for successive detection of the inner and outer rows of tags that is dependent on the point-of-origin of a sensor transit path across the double row of tags. Additional embodiments are disclosed and claimed.

Claims

1. An industrial facility comprising a vehicle travel plane, at least one aisle path, a plurality of storage elements, a tag layout, and at least one ingress/egress zone, wherein:

the aisle path, tag layout, and ingress/egress zone are located on the vehicle travel plane;

the storage elements are arranged along, and on opposite sides of, the aisle path;

the tag layout comprises at least one double row of tags comprising an inner row of tags and an outer row of tags;

the ingress/egress zone is located outside of an area of the vehicle travel plane occupied by the aisle path and is bounded in its entirety by the double row of tags, by two or more double rows of tags, by a combination of one or more double rows of tags and one more selected facility boundaries, or by combinations thereof; and

the double row of tags is arranged in an n×

m matrix of n tag rows and m tag columns, the matrix configured for successive detection of the inner and outer rows of tags that is dependent on the point-of-origin of a sensor transit path across the double row of tags, where

individual tags of the outer row of tags are closer to points of entry into said ingress/egress zone than are individual tags of the inner row of tags,

individual tags of the inner row of tags are closer to points of exit from the ingress/egress zone than are individual tags of the outer row of tags, and

m>

n>

1.

2. The industrial facility as claimed in claim 1 wherein:

individual tags of the outer row of tags are spaced such that their transmit signal ranges are sufficient to provide a continuous read threshold for sensors traversing a sensor transit path across the outer row of tags; and

individual tags of the inner row of tags are spaced such that their transmit signal ranges are sufficient to provide a continuous read threshold for sensors traversing a sensor transit path across the inner row of tags.

3. The industrial facility as claimed in claim 1 wherein:

individual tags of the outer row of tags are spaced such that their transmit signal ranges overlap; and

individual tags of the inner row of tags are spaced such that their transmit signal ranges overlap.

4. The industrial facility as claimed in claim 1 wherein:

the industrial facility comprises a plurality of aisle paths, a majority of which comprise a common industrial vehicle operating width w; and

the double row of tags is characterized by a row spacing s that is smaller than the industrial vehicle operating width w.

5. The industrial facility as claimed in claim 4 wherein:

the double row of tags spans an ingress/egress threshold (T) that is large enough to accommodate the industrial vehicle operating width w; and

the ingress/egress zone is large enough to accommodate the industrial vehicle operating width w.

6. The industrial facility as claimed in claim 1 wherein the ingress/egress zone is operatively bounded in its entirety by the double row of tags.

7. The industrial facility as claimed in claim 1 wherein the ingress/egress zone is operatively bounded in its entirety by two or more double rows of tags.

8. The industrial facility as claimed in claim 1 wherein the ingress/egress zone is operatively bounded in its entirety by a combination of one or more double rows of tags and one more selected facility boundaries.

9. The industrial facility as claimed in claim 1 wherein the ingress/egress zone is operatively bounded in its entirety by a combination of one or more double rows of tags and an aisle path.

10. The industrial facility as claimed in claim 1 wherein the ingress/egress zone is operatively bounded in its entirety by a combination of one or more double rows of tags and a facility passageway.

11. The industrial facility as claimed in claim 1 wherein the ingress/egress zone is operatively bounded in its entirety by a combination of one or more double rows of tags and a plurality of aisle paths.

12. The industrial facility as claimed in claim 1 wherein the ingress/egress zone is operatively bounded in its entirety by a combination two or more double rows of tags and a facility wall.

13. The industrial facility as claimed in claim 1 wherein the facility boundary comprises an aisle path of the industrial facility.

14. The industrial facility as claimed in claim 1 wherein the facility boundary comprises a passageway of the industrial facility.

15. The industrial facility as claimed in claim 1 wherein the facility boundary comprises a wall, a step, an elevation change in the vehicle travel plane, another type of transport barrier, or combinations thereof.

16. The industrial facility as claimed in claim 1 wherein the double row of tags comprise unique identification codes with one or more changeable bit locations.

17. An industrial facility comprising a vehicle travel plane, at least one aisle path, a plurality of storage elements, a tag layout, and at least one ingress/egress zone, wherein:

the aisle path, tag layout, and ingress/egress zone are located on the vehicle travel plane;

the storage elements are arranged along, and on opposite sides of, the aisle path;

the tag layout comprises at least one double row of tags comprising an inner row of tags and an outer row of tags;

the ingress/egress zone is located at least partially within an area of the vehicle travel plane occupied by the aisle path and is operatively bounded in its entirety by one or more double rows of tags and the aisle path; and

the double row of tags is arranged in an n×

m matrix of n tag rows and m tag columns, the matrix configured for successive detection of the inner and outer rows of tags that is dependent on the point-of-origin of a sensor transit path across the double row of tags, where

individual tags of the outer row of tags are closer to points of entry into said ingress/egress zone than are individual tags of the inner row of tags,

individual tags of the inner row of tags are closer to points of exit from the ingress/egress zone than are individual tags of the outer row of tags, and

m>

n>

1.

18. The industrial facility as claimed in claim 17 wherein:

the ingress/egress zone is located entirely within an area of the vehicle travel plane occupied by the aisle path; and

the double row of tags spans an ingress/egress threshold that extends laterally across the aisle path.

19. The industrial facility as claimed in claim 17 wherein:

the ingress/egress zone is located entirely within an area of the vehicle travel plane occupied by the aisle path; and

the double row of tags spans an ingress/egress threshold that extends laterally across an end of the aisle path.

20. An industrial facility comprising a vehicle travel plane, at least one aisle path, a plurality of storage elements, and a tag layout, wherein:

the aisle path and the tag layout are located on the vehicle travel plane;

the storage elements are arranged along, and on opposite sides of, the aisle path;

the tag layout comprises at least one succession of individual tags spaced uniformly to define a tag spacing s′

;

the succession of individual tags is interrupted by at least one tag pair comprising a primary tag and a secondary tag;

the primary tag and the secondary tag of each tag pair define a tag spacing s″

; and

the tag spacing s′

is greater than the tag spacing s″

.