The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Mar. 28, 1989
Filed:
Mar. 10, 1986
Nikolai Eberhardt, Bethlehem, PA (US);
SI Handling Systems, Inc., Easton, PA (US);
Abstract
Automatic guided vehicle system for guiding a driverless vehicle over a predetermined path of travel without any tracks, wires or the like. The vehicle is provided with an active optical navigation section for determining vehicle position and bearing by scanning plural beacons distributed within the zone of travel of the vehicle, a passive ground navigation section including a gyrocompass for measuring changes in bearing of the vehicle and a wheel encoder for measuring distance traveled by the vehicle's steering wheel. Memory onboard the vehicle contains a series of path vectors which define a predetermined path of travel for the vehicle. The ground navigation section updates vehicle position and bearing as determined by the optical navigation section. A programmed onboard computer includes driver software for generating steering data so as to guide the vehicle over a corrective arc path from its position and bearing as determined by the navigation sections to the desired position and bearing as indicated by a stored path vector.