Alternative and Economic Way for High Speed Routing and Mapping

The ongoing evolution in warehouse automation has accelerated the development of various robotic systems, including Automated Guided Vehicles (AGVs), Autonomous Mobile Robots (AMRs), and Rail Guided Vehicles (RGVs). To ensure these robotic systems can effectively follow designated paths or navigate freely in today’s dynamic warehouse environments, it is essential to equip them with high-performance position tracking sensors for seamless navigation.

PixArt's Optical Tracking Sensor (OTS), with proven tracking capabilities in the industrial and automation sectors, offers exceptional support for robots navigating complex environments. Engineered with PixArt's proprietary algorithm, the OTS sensors deliver high-speed tracking with low error rates across a wide working range, ensuring adaptability to various operational scenarios. Powerful yet compact, the sensors' small form factors further facilitate effortless integration into robotic systems of all sizes, whether designed for large warehouses or small storage spaces.

The CMOS image-based OTS sensors provide 2-axis output of movement magnitude and direction in counts/cm or counts/inch. In contrast to tracking methods that depend on intermediary objects (e.g., wheels) to convert rotation into displacement measurements, the OTS sensor directly tracks the surface and measures displacement by analyzing changes in images captured at each time frame. This approach not only ensures more accurate feedback but also offers the following advantages:

1. Wheel Slippage Detection: A significant discrepancy between the displacement reported by the OTS sensor and that derived from wheel rotation may indicate wheel slippage. Enabling the robotic system to trigger alerts in such scenarios allows for early intervention, helping to minimize the impact of wheel slippage and assisting in identifying a potentially stuck robot.

2. Consistent Performance in Sparse Environments: Unlike sensors that rely on environmental changes, such as LIDAR or cameras—which may struggle in areas with few surrounding objects—the OTS sensor maintains robust performance even in environments with minimal features.

In real-life situations, sensor fusion may be required to ensure that every inch of the warehouse flooring is fully covered. Despite the OTS sensor's broad surface coverage, there may be instances where the flooring material is rare and falls outside its trackable range. In such cases, the OTS sensor is designed to quickly resume tracking at full speed immediately after passing the non-trackable area.

PixArt is your answer for creating robotic systems with reliable positioning and efficient path-planning capabilities, including those built for demanding warehouse environments. For more information about our solutions, please visit the product links on the left or browse our OTS product pages.