Tomáš Kot

Utilization of the Oculus Rift HMD in Mobile Robot Teleoperation

This paper mentions some problems related to utilization of a head-mounted display (HMD) for remote control of mobile robots by a human operator and also presents a possible solution. Considered is specifically the new HMD device called Oculus Rift, which is a very interesting device because of its great parameters and low price. The device is described in the beginning, together with some of the specific principles of the Oculus 3D display. Then follows the design of a new graphical user interface for teleoperation, with main focus on visualization of stereoscopic images from robot cameras. Demonstrated is also a way how to display additional data and information to the operator. The overall aim is to create a comfortable and highly effective interface suitable both for exploration and manipulation tasks in mobile robotics.

Control System of the Mobile Robot TELERESCUER

This paper describes a Main control system of the mobile robot TELERESCUER for inspecting coal mine areas affected by catastrophic events. Carried out in a framework of a EU programme of the Research Fund for Coal and Steel under the grant agreement No. RFCR-CT-2014-00002. The main problem is to applicate the very demanding safe requirements of ATEX on the design of the control system including its communication with other robot subsystems. The solving of this problem is presented in this paper.

The Design of 3D Laser Range Finder for Robot Navigation and Mapping in Industrial Environment with Point Clouds Preprocessing

This article describes the design of 3D Laser range finder LRF for industrial and mine environment. The 3D LRF is designed for usage on middle size robots and can be used for environment mapping and navigation. The design reflects heavy and dirty working conditions in industrial environment and it is equipped by own methane sensor for usage in mine. The process of design started with definition of requirements, follows by dynamic analysis and selection of suitable parts. The housing is designed from stainless steel and it encloses all electrical and mechanical components. The internal control unit is designed to suit modern trends of fog computing. It is equipped with four cores ARM CPU and IMU and it is able to preprocess the acquired point clouds in real time.

Exploration Mobile Robot for Coal Mines

This paper describes a Main Control System (MCS) and 3D map subsystem of the mobile robot TELERESCUER for inspecting coal mine areas affected by catastrophic events. It is carried out in a framework of a EU programme of the Research Fund for Coal and Steel under the grant agreement No. RFCR-CT-2014-00002. The interesting problem is to applicate the very demanding safe requirements of ATEX on the design of the control system including its communication with other robot subsystems. Due to a very innovative and advanced HMI the system allows the rescuer to operate the robot as if he were at the very center point of the scene of the robot’s operation.6 This project is solved by consortium of: Silesian University of Technology (Poland), VSB – Technical University of Ostrava (Czech Republic), AITEMIN (Spain), SIMMERSION GMBH (Austria) and SKYTECH RESEARCH (Poland).

Virtual Operator Station for Teleoperated Mobile Robots

This paper deals with utilization of a head-mounted display (HMD) for remote control of mobile robots by a human operator. The main goal is to make control of the robot and navigation in unknown terrain easier for the operator by providing stereoscopic images and using virtual reality. Considered is specifically the new HMD device called Oculus Rift, which is a very interesting device because of its great parameters and low price. The device is described in the beginning, together with some of the specific principles of the Oculus 3D display. Then follows the design of a new graphical user interface for teleoperation – virtual operator station, with main focus on visualization of stereoscopic images from robot cameras. Demonstrated is also a way how to display additional data and information to the operator. The resulting interface is a comfortable and highly effective system suitable both for exploration and manipulation tasks in mobile robotics.

System for automatic collisions prevention for a manipulator arm of a mobile robot

Control systems of mobile robots controlled remotely by a human operator using only limited visual feedback from camera subsystem can aid the operator in various ways. This paper deals with automatic collision detection for manipulator arm mounted on a mobile robot - the goal of the system is to prevent any possible collisions between the arm and the robot or the arm itself. Implementation of the system uses the separating axis algorithm on pairs of oriented bounding boxes enveloping mechanical components of the robot. Practical testing of the whole control system was done on two existing mobile robots.

The Synthesis and Testing of a Shaped Wheel for Stairs Climbing Robot

This article describes the process of designing and testing of shaped wheels for a mobile robotic stairclimbing system. It explains the basic principle of the shaped wheel and a synthesis of the shape and dimensions of the wheel segment for specified dimensions of the stairs. Before building a reduced prototype of a chassis with the designed wheels, simulations of its virtual model were performed in the ADAMS simulation environment. Functionality of the suggested solution was verified by building a prototype and its testing. The article is concluded with description of the achieved results and other research activities planned in the sphere of locomotive subsystems for stairclimbing.

Rendering of 3D Maps with Additional Information for Operator of a Coal Mine Mobile Robot

The paper focuses on visualization of point clouds made by a 3D scanner mounted on a mobile robot Telerescuer designed for reconnaissance of coal mines affected by a disaster. Briefly are described some algorithms used for point cloud pre-processing – voxelization for data reduction, outliers removing for filtering of erroneous data and smoothing for additional filtering of noise data. These algorithms are implemented in C++ using the Point Cloud Library.

Simulation System for Teleoperated Mobile Robots

The paper presents a mobile robot simulator designed primarily for teleoperated mobile robots, to aid in the prototyping phase of development or as a training tool for existing robots. The simulator uses virtual reality with realistic 3D graphics to simulate complex behaviour of a mobile robot in various conditions and with different properties. The system can be used to discover or verify driving and manipulation abilities of a mobile robot defined by its kinematics structure and dimensions, and also to simulate navigation using the camera subsystem containing one or more cameras.

Application of virtual reality in teleoperation of the military mobile robotic system TAROS

The article presents some aspects of a complex control system of a teleoperated military mobile robot Tactical Robotic System (TAROS) related to virtual reality and assistance to a human operator in general. Described is especially the unique and innovative system of virtual operator station which uses the HMD Oculus Rift to put the operator into a virtual space containing visual feedback from the robot and camera images, including stereovision. The virtual operator station serves as a cost-effective and portable replacement of what otherwise would be a large room with expensive equipment. Mentioned is also another system that helps the operator with remote manipulation tasks – the anti-collision system preventing damage done to the mechanical parts of the robot by incautious movements of the manipulator arm.