Date on Master's Thesis/Doctoral Dissertation

4-2010

Document Type

Master's Thesis

Degree Name

M. Eng.

Department

Mechanical Engineering

Committee Chair

Richards, Christopher

Subject

All terrain vehicles--Automatic control; Motor vehicles--Automatic control; Intelligent control systems

Abstract

When tracked vehicles traverse terrain such as sand, soil, or even concrete, they may encounter a variance in density or viscosity of the medium that the vehicle is traveling along. When this happens, one track begins to move faster or slower relative to the ground than its counterpart, causing a change in its orientation and position. Autonomous tracked vehicles must be able to detect how much change occurred in the orientation and position of the vehicle and it must then determine a new path to reach the target location. This paper focuses on development of the ability for a small tracked vehicle to detect when a slip has occurred, how much the vehicle has slipped and how the autonomous vehicle should correct for the slip that has occurred. Three different algorithms are tested, the Straight Line Slip Method, the Arc Extension Method and the Arc Compensation Method. The Arc Compensation Method returned the best and most predictable results. The Arc Compensation Method averaged 60 mm to the target location from where the vehicle stopped the smallest of the three methods. This method also maintained a smaller standard deviation and range for the distance to the target location than the other two methods.

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