Honda Motor Co., Ltd.

Honda Research Institute Europe Gmbh

Hideaki Shimamura

Naoki Kameyama

Keiji Muro

Yuki Matsui

Atsuhisa Ishikawa

Makoto Yamamura

Mitsuaki Kubota

Takao Tamechika

Takeshi Inaba

Hikaru Ikeda

Yoshio Ohtomo

Satoshi Onodera

Tomoki Fukushima

Markus Olhofer

Akihito Kasai

Ryota Hisada

Runa Kaneko

Sebastian Schmitt

Ken Yamauchi

In a work management device and a work management method, in the case where the number of autonomous mobile working machines used in performing work has been changed, or in the case where, among a plurality of assigned working regions, a difference that is greater than or equal to a percentage threshold value has occurred in a work completion percentage, which is a ratio of a portion where the work is completed to each of the assigned working regions, resetting of the assigned working regions is carried out.

Work management device and work management method

A traveling body is provided. A reception unit receives first information regarding a state of payment related to use of the traveling body from a payment management server that manages the state of payment. A traveling mechanism is driven under control of a control unit capable of limiting traveling of the traveling body according to the state of payment. A transmission unit transmits second information based on the first information to the control unit.

Traveling body, payment management system, and vehicle

A control device for executing travel control of a self-propelled work machine, comprising a turning unit that turns the work machine such that the work machine travels inside a boundary of a work region, an evaluation unit that evaluates complexity of a shape of the boundary in the work region, and a changing unit that changes a turning mode of the work machine when the work machine is turned based on an evaluation result by the evaluation unit.

Control device and work machine

A control apparatus of an autonomously navigating work machine driven by drive units while servicing a work area which is equipped with an information acquisition unit that acquires information relating to a navigation-desired region where navigation is desired inside or outside of the work area, a search unit that searches for a navigation route from a current location of the work machine to a desired location based on acquired information relating to the navigation-desired region, and a control unit that drives the work machine to run by driving the drive units in accordance with the navigation route searched by the search unit.

Control apparatus of autonomously navigating work machine

A growing state of a plant is appropriately managed with a convenient method. For example, a control apparatus to control a work machine with an autonomous movement function includes an illuminance information obtaining section to obtain the illuminance information indicating at least one of (i) the illuminance of the work machine in motion and (ii) the illuminance of a region located on an advancing direction of the work machine in motion and a control section to control at least one of an advancing direction, an advancing speed, a work mode and a travel mode of the work machine based on the illuminance information obtained by the illuminance information obtaining section.

Control apparatus, work machine, control method, and computer readable storage medium

A work zone boundary demarcation apparatus to demarcate boundaries that divide a work area (AR) to be serviced by at least one autonomously navigating work machine into multiple zones (ARn), equipped with a computer having at least a processor, a memory, an input-output circuit and a simulation program loaded in the memory to simulate work of the work machine in the work area; wherein the processor is configured to perform as a boundary demarcation unit that demarcates boundaries which divide the work area into multiple zones, a simulation execution unit that executes simulation of work of the work machine in the multiple zones divided by the boundaries demarcated by the boundary demarcation unit, a boundary re-demarcation unit that re-demarcates boundaries demarcated by the boundary demarcation unit based on results of the simulation executed by the simulation execution unit, and a zone display unit that displays the multiple zones divided by the boundaries re-demarcated by the boundary re-demarcation unit.

Work area zone boundary demarcation apparatus of autonomously navigating work machine

A moving efficiency of a work machine decreases if an obstacle, an entrance prohibiting region, and the like are arranged inside a region, if a positioning precision of the work machine is relatively low, and the like. A control apparatus includes a control section to control a movement of a moving object based on at least one of a completion level of map information indicating a region where a moving object is permitted to enter and a location estimation precision of a moving object.

To make it possible to correct a current position detected by an autonomous traveling work machine to the correct position with a simple configuration. A robot lawn mower includes a first position detecting unit for detecting a current position by using odometry and a second position detecting unit for detecting a current position by using an image capture. When position detection accuracy of both of the first and second position detecting units decreases to less than or equal to a predetermined value, the robot lawn mower is controlled to travel to either of zones Zand Zin which the position detection accuracy of the second position detecting unit is relatively high, and when the robot lawn mower moves to either of the zones Zand Z, a current position used for autonomous traveling is corrected to the current position detected by the second position detecting unit.

Autonomous traveling work machine

It includes an intensity pattern determination section to determine an intensity pattern indicating a distribution of a magnitude of a target quantity in at least a part of a moving path of the moving object, a subarea determination section to determine, among a plurality of subareas, one or more subareas having an intensity pattern which matches or is similar to an intensity pattern determined by the intensity pattern determination section based on map information which associates area identification information which identifies each of a plurality of subareas included in a target region having a predetermined geographic range and an intensity parameter indicating a magnitude of a target quantity premeasured in the subarea, and an output section to output, as a location of the moving object, one or more subareas determined by the subarea determination section.

Location estimation apparatus, moving object, location estimation method, and computer-readable storage medium

A technology for improving a positioning precision is desired in a case where a positioning precision of a positioning signal is relatively low. A location estimation apparatus includes a sub area extraction section configured to extract one or more sub areas including at least a part of a region defined by a location and an error range indicated by positioning information, a precision parameter extraction section configured to refer to map information in which area identification information is associated with a precision parameter indicating a positioning precision and extract, with regard to each of the one or more sub areas extracted by the sub area extraction section, the precision parameter, and an output section configured to output the sub area where the positioning precision indicated by the precision parameter is equal to or worse than the positioning precision indicated by the positioning information, as a location of a moving object.

Location estimation apparatus, moving object, location estimation method, and computer readable storage medium

An unmanned lawn mowing system includes a plurality of unmanned lawn mowers that perform work while traveling without a human operator and a management server. Each of the unmanned lawn mowers includes an information transmission section that transmits operation information including information indicating a work state to the management server. The management server includes: a case storage section that stores a case related to a failure in and/or a case related to maintenance of each of the unmanned lawn mowers; a maintenance determination section that determines whether or not maintenance of the unmanned lawn mower is necessary, based on the case associated with operation information identical or similar to the operation information; and a maintenance notification transmission section that notifies maintenance to the unmanned lawn mowers, based on a determination result made by the maintenance determination section.

Unmanned work system, management server, and unmanned work machine

A system and method are provided for setting parameters in an autonomous working device. The autonomous working device can be controlled based on a plurality of parameters. For each of a plurality of different working environments a set of sensor values is generated. The plurality of sets is partitioned into categories, each category corresponding to a prototypical working environment. The parameters for each category are optimized to find an optimized parameter set for each prototypical working environment. For an individual working environment, an individual set of sensor values that the sensors of the autonomous working device produce is generated. Based at least on the individual set of sensor values, the prototypical working environment showing highest similarity to the individual environment is determined, and the parameters in the autonomous working device are set according to the optimized parameter set corresponding to the determined prototypical working environment.

Method for setting parameters in an autonomous working device and an autonomous working device

In an apparatus for controlling operation of a utility vehicle that detects a magnetic field generated by electric current flowing through a boundary wire of a working area and is driven to run within the working area based on the detected magnetic field, having left and right magnetic sensor installed at lateral right and left positions of the vehicle to produce outputs proportional to strength of the magnetic field, turning mode is switched between gentle turning mode to make the vehicle turn while running near the boundary wire and sharp turning mode to make the vehicle pause near the boundary wire and then turn, when it is determined from the outputs of the magnetic sensors that the vehicle approaches the boundary wire, each time predetermined conditions are satisfied, and operation of the prime mover is controlled such that the vehicle turns in accordance with the switched turning mode.

Control apparatus for utility vehicle

An apparatus for controlling a water pump having an engine that drives an impeller, a water storage tank connected to the water pump, a first water level detector that outputs an A signal when a water level is at or higher than a first height and outputs a B signal when lower than the height, a second water level detector that outputs the A signal when the water level is at or lower than a second height and outputs the B signal when higher than the height, a connection switcher that switches connection of the first and second water level detector, and an impeller controller connected to the connection switcher and adapted to control operation of the engine that drives the impeller of the water pump based on the signals outputted from the first and second water level detectors.

Water pump control apparatus

In an apparatus for controlling operation of an autonomously navigating utility vehicle travelling about a working area delineated by a boundary wire, the working area including a narrow area and a broad area, there are provided with a magnetic field strength detector, a travel controlling unit controlling the vehicle to turn and travel straight forward every time the vehicle reaches the boundary wire based on the magnetic field strength, and a narrow area discriminating unit discriminating that the vehicle travels in the narrow area when the magnetic field strength is kept to be greater than a threshold value predefined based on a minimum value of the magnetic field strength in the narrow area from a first turn to a second turn of the vehicle, or for a predetermined time period after the first turn.

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Wako, Japan

Hideaki Shimamura