We need an industrial grade remote-controllable 4WD rover (that would work on typical factory floor) that should handle various loads upto 2 kilograms but would always maintain adjustable speed (like moving with 1 meter/second speed with or without the load once it is speed setting is adjusted). Thanks in advance for your support
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Hi @icatalay and welcome to our forum.
Can you tell us what is your budget for this project?
I would recommend that you have a look at Roboworks products on RobotShop website: https://eu.robotshop.com/collections/roboworks
For example, this platform could be suitable for you: Mecabot Pro Nano - RobotShop
Hello Ä°gor, thank you for prompt reply.
The product you have recommended seems alright and within our budget (my company will pay) however we do not want to buy something not necessary. For example there is a lidar and depth camera that is extra since our aim is not to develop and AGV but to have 4 wheeled solution whose direction and speed could be set (to specific values like turn 90 degrees left or keep up strict 1 m/s speed) via remote application. We do not need environment detecting sensors for this project.
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Hi @icatalay and thank you for this clarification.
We now have a better feeling about the robot you need, but we have some additional questions:
- Since you mentioned "typical factory floor’, is there a preference for wheels, track or mecanum wheels?
- What aspects of the robot need to be “industrial”? Does it need to withstand dust, dirt and debris?
- Regarding wireless control. Have in mind that wireless control has issues in a location with a lot of machines and walls which might block the signal.
- What will the robot be used for? Inspection for example? If yes, here you can see Defense, Security, Surveillance & Inspection Robots sold by RobotShop:
Defense, Security, Surveillance & Inspection Robots - RobotShop
Looking forward to your reply.
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Since you mentioned "typical factory floor’, is there a preference for wheels, track or mecanum wheels?
No, as long as they are durable -
What aspects of the robot need to be “industrial”? Does it need to withstand dust, dirt and debris?
Some dust/dirt resistance would be preferred. No debris involved. The rover would operate indoors -
Regarding wireless control. Have in mind that wireless control has issues in a location with a lot of machines and walls which might block the signal.
Actually, we can afford the guy having remote control always being in Line-Of-Sight of the rover. However it should be via BLE and through an APP in smartphone -
What will the robot be used for? Inspection for example? If yes, here you can see Defense, Security, Surveillance & Inspection Robots sold by RobotShop:
No it is not for inspection or surveillance. This will hopefully be part of a locationing test/validation solution. We are an industrial RTLS company and the this rover (with and UWB tag on it) would follow special (with known coordinates) trajectories in the factory (having UWB locationing infrastructure in walls) in constant speeds so that we can see/measure how accurate our moving platform locationing solution works.
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Thank you for clarification.
Additional questions:
- Does it have to be APP controlled or it can be controlled via RC joystick?
- What are the minimal dimensions for the surface you need for mounting your equipment on the rover?
It could be an RC Joystick but APP control would be preferable
The minimal surface dimensions for UWB tag is very small (like 100 cm2). However we would like to have 1500-2000 cm2 area to put boxes and payloads.
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Good day @icatalay,
Based on your inputs, have a look at these suggestion. They are in descending price order:
Feel free to ask anything else.
Hello Ä°gor,
Very helpful suggestions indded. The last one from Lynxmotion seems interesting as it is considerably cost effective. However I could not be sure, this is a complete kit with RC right? Do I need to add any electronics or microprocessor to it?
If this is the case, it is not so obvious how it would be possible to adjust the speed and keep it constant? Maybe forward movement actuator enables “accelarate” and “decelerate” so that one can adjust the moving speed. Would you be able to elaborate?
@icatalay Welcome to the RobotShop Community. Indeed, RB-Lyn-1136 includes everything for a remotely controlled A4WD3.
If this is the case, it is not so obvious how it would be possible to adjust the speed and keep it constant? Maybe forward movement actuator enables “accelarate” and “decelerate” so that one can adjust the moving speed. Would you be able to elaborate?
You are correct that the only speed adjustment in remote control mode is the joystick. Note that the encoders for each motor are not connected, so it cannot measure if it’s going in a straight line etc. Any robot platform where you want constant speed will need encoders and a microcontroller. The choice of microcontroller will depends on your needs and the IO needed. The motors in the A4WD3 are:
Specs: https://cdn.robotshop.com/media/2/2dm/rb-2dm-02/pdf/36gp540-51-en.pdf
Each encoder would need two IO, for a total of 8. If you also want to use the Remote control, it will need several IO as well.
Most importantly though you’ll need to program the microcontroller to constantly read all IO as well as the signals from the receiver.
There is a “PWM” library for Arduino for example to help you get started with reading the PWM signals from an RC receiver, as well as sample code on how to use optical encoders, but it’s really up to you to put it all together. Note that many other users have done this successfully, so there might be sample code available somewhere on Google.
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