Autonomous mobile object and storage medium for autonomous mobile object

• US 10,737,392 B2
• Filed: 10/31/2017
• Issued: 08/11/2020
• Est. Priority Date: 11/08/2016
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Toyota Jidosha Kabushiki Kaisha (Toyota Motor Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Toyota Jidosha Kabushiki Kaisha (Toyota Motor Corporation)
• Inventors: Yamamoto, Kazuya, Okumatsu, Yoshihiro, Yamaguchi, Ui, Tanaka, Masatomo
• Primary Examiner(s): Jen, Ian
• Application Number:
  US15/799,333
• Publication Number:
  US 20180126560A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,015 Days
• CPC Class Codes: B08B 1/165 Scrapers
• CPC Class Codes: B08B 5/02 Cleaning by the force of jets, e.g. blowing-out cavities airguns or nozzles per se B05B1/005
• CPC Class Codes: B25J 19/005 using batteries, e.g. as a back-up power source
• CPC Class Codes: B25J 5/007 mounted on wheels
• CPC Class Codes: B25J 9/162 Mobile manipulator, movable base with manipulator arm mounted on it
• CPC Class Codes: B25J 9/1697 Vision controlled systems
• CPC Class Codes: B60L 2200/40 Working vehicles
• CPC Class Codes: B60L 53/14 Conductive energy transfer
• CPC Class Codes: B60L 53/36 by positioning the vehicle
• CPC Class Codes: B60L 53/37 using optical position determination, e.g. using cameras
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 2219/45082 Sanding robot, to clean surfaces
• CPC Class Codes: G05B 2219/45098 Vacuum cleaning robot
• CPC Class Codes: G05D 1/0225 involving docking at a fixed facility, e.g. base station or loading bay parking aids B62D15/027
• CPC Class Codes: G05D 1/0246 using a video camera in combination with image processing means
• CPC Class Codes: G08B 7/06 using electric transmission , e.g. involving audible and visible signalling through the use of sound and light sources
• CPC Class Codes: Y02T 10/70 Energy storage systems for electromobility, e.g. batteries
• CPC Class Codes: Y02T 10/7072 Electromobility specific charging systems or methods for batteries, ultracapacitors, supercapacitors or double-layer capacitors
• CPC Class Codes: Y02T 90/12 Electric charging stations
• CPC Class Codes: Y02T 90/14 Plug-in electric vehicles
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 901/01 Mobile robot
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 901/44 : inspection

Abstract

An autonomous mobile object includes: a moving mechanism; a power-receiving terminal that is supplied with power from a power-supply terminal; an imaging unit configured to image the power-supply terminal at a position separated from the power-supply terminal by more than a distance at which the power-receiving terminal is capable of being supplied with power from the power-supply terminal; a determination unit configured to determine whether to remove contamination of the power-supply terminal based on an analysis result obtained by analyzing the image captured by the imaging unit and information on misalignment between the power-supply terminal and the power-receiving terminal, the misalignment being predicted when the autonomous mobile object moves to a position at which the power-receiving terminal is capable of being supplied with power from the power-supply terminal; and a removal unit configured to remove the contamination when the determination unit determines to remove the contamination.

Claims

1. An autonomous mobile object comprising:

a moving mechanism that is used for the autonomous mobile object to move autonomously;

a power-receiving terminal that is supplied with power from a power-supply terminal located outside the autonomous mobile object;

an imaging unit configured to image the power-supply terminal at a position separated from the power-supply terminal by more than a distance at which the power-receiving terminal is capable of being supplied with power from the power-supply terminal;

a determination unit configured to determine whether to remove contamination of the power-supply terminal based on an analysis result obtained by analyzing the image captured by the imaging unit and information on misalignment between the power-supply terminal and the power-receiving terminal, the misalignment being predicted when the autonomous mobile object moves to a position at which the power-receiving terminal is capable of being supplied with power from the power-supply terminal using the moving mechanism; and

a removal unit configured to remove the contamination when the determination unit determines to remove the contamination.

2. The autonomous mobile object according to claim 1, wherein the determination unit is configured to perform the determination using an evaluation function of increasing a likelihood of determination to remove the contamination as the misalignment between the power-supply terminal and the power-receiving terminal increases.

3. The autonomous mobile object according to claim 1, wherein the determination unit specifies a type of the contamination based on the image, and

the removal unit is configured to change a tool that is used to remove the contamination depending on the type specified by the determination unit.

4. The autonomous mobile object according to claim 1, further comprising:

a robot hand configured to grip a work object of work that is performed by the autonomous mobile object, the robot hand being used as at least a part of the removal unit to remove the contamination.

5. The autonomous mobile object according to claim 1, wherein the information on the misalignment is stored in a storage unit as a database indicating a predicted contact proportion between the power-supply terminal and the power-receiving terminal, the database being prepared depending on a relative position of the autonomous mobile object to the power-supply terminal.

6. The autonomous mobile object according to claim 1, wherein the determination unit is configured to determine whether to remove the contamination of the power-supply terminal based on a predicted contact proportion between the power-supply terminal and the power-receiving terminal that is extracted from the information on the misalignment and a degree of deterioration in power supply efficiency due to the contamination that is analyzed from the image.

7. The autonomous mobile object according to claim 1, further comprising:

a warning unit configured to issue a warning to a user when power supply work performed after the removal unit removes the contamination fails.

8. The autonomous mobile object according to claim 1, wherein the imaging unit is a part of an environment sensor that acquires surrounding environment information for autonomous movement.

9. A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium for an autonomous mobile object, the storage medium storing a computer program and causing a computer to perform, when the computer program is executed:

an imaging step of imaging a power-supply terminal located outside the autonomous mobile object in a state in which a power-receiving terminal that is supplied with power from the power-supply terminal is at a position separated from the power-supply terminal by more than a distance at which the power-receiving terminal is capable of being supplied with power from the power-supply terminal;

an analysis step of analyzing the image captured in the imaging step;

a calculation step of calculating an amount of misalignment between the power-supply terminal and the power-receiving terminal, the misalignment being predicted when the autonomous mobile object moves to a position at which the power-receiving terminal is capable of being supplied with power from the power-supply terminal;

a determination step of determining whether to remove contamination of the power-supply terminal based on an analysis result in the analysis step and the amount of misalignment calculated in the calculation step; and

a removal step of removing the contamination when removing the contamination is determined in the determination step.