Browse Topic: Mobility
ABSTRACT GS Engineering has developed technology to advance the sensory perception of autonomous systems. The Automatic Terrain Detection System (ATDS) is a technology that provides real time terrain detection. Vehicles deployed with ATDS have been able to yield improved mobility, automation of systems, and reduced fuel consumption. ATDS has been integrated into the MK23 MTVR, M1151 HMMWV for the ONR Predictive Adaptive Mobility (PAM) program, and into the Autonomous Ground Re-supply (AGR) by-wire kit for the Oshkosh Defense Palletized Load System (PLS). The ATDS is built upon proven sensors running integrated processing to replace or enhance existing vehicle systems. Citation: D. Subert, A. Diepen, K. Hubert, “Automatic Terrain Detection”, In Proceedings of the Ground Vehicle Systems Engineering and Technology Symposium (GVSETS), NDIA, Novi, MI, Aug. 13-15, 2019
ABSTRACT The Product Director Light Tactical Vehicles (PdD LTV) is responsible for the Army’s High Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicle (HMMWV) family of vehicles. Due to the large number of variants found throughout the Army plus the continued need for their service into the foreseeable future, the Army has conducted extensive depot recapitalization programs and continues to explore modernization options to sustain enduring requirements. Because competing performance requirements exist and budget constraints demand careful design choices, PdD LTV commissioned the development of a Whole System Trades Analysis Tool (WSTAT) specified for the HMMWV family of vehicles to help gain an analytic understanding of the key performance, cost, risk, and growth tradeoffs inherent within their potential designs. The WSTAT provides a holistic framework for modeling and understanding these tradeoffs. In this paper, the overarching WSTAT methodology is presented along with the specific implementation
ABSTRACT Evolving requirements for combat vehicles to provide increased mission capability and/or crew safety necessitate the addition of components and add-on armor to currently-fielded vehicles. These new requirements result in increased weight and increased electrical needs, which result in reduced mobility. The APD is built from the ground up to optimize a powertrain solution using cutting-edge technology specifically designed for harsh military environments, for use in both vehicle retrofits and new vehicle designs. The APD combines an efficient 1000 hp engine, transmission, integrated starter generator, thermal management system, and lithium-ion batteries to maximize powerpack power density. The APD was designed for a 45-60 ton combat vehicle, but designing for scalability, reconfigurability, and using modern techniques and technology has allowed the APD to greatly improve the capability and flexibility of the powerpack and the technology can be applied to heavier or lighter
This study aims to explore the multifaceted influencing factors of market acceptance and consumer behavior of low-altitude flight services through online surveys and advanced neuroscientific methods (such as functional magnetic resonance imaging fMRI, electroencephalography EEG, functional near-infrared spectroscopy fNIRS) combined with artificial intelligence and video advertisement quantitative analysis. We conducted an in-depth study of the current trends in low-altitude flight vehicle development and customer acceptance of low-altitude services, focusing particularly on the survey methods used for market acceptance. To overcome the influence of strong opinion leaders in volunteer group experiments, we designed specialized surveys targeting broader online and social media groups. Utilizing specialized knowledge in aviation psychology, we designed a distinctive questionnaire and, within just 7 days of its launch, gathered a significant number of valid responses. The data was then
ABSTRACT Route planning plays an integral role in mission planning for ground vehicle operations in urban areas. Determining the optimum path through an urban area is a well understood problem for traditional ground vehicles; however, in the case of autonomous unmanned ground vehicles (UGVs), additional factors must be considered. For a UGV, perception, rather than mobility, will be the limiting factor in determining operational areas. Current ground vehicle route planning techniques do not take perception concerns into account, and these techniques are not suited for route planning for UGVs. For this study, perception was incorporated into the route planning process by including expected sensor accuracy for GPS, LIDAR, and inertial sensors into the path planning algorithm. The path planner also accounts for additional factors related to UGV performance capabilities that affect autonomous navigation
ABSTRACT This paper discusses the semi-active suspension system developed by A.M. General to provide mobility and maneuverability for tactical, wheeled vehicles
ABSTRACT The following paper describes the new SAPA automatic transmissions for the future military vehicles. The very high mobility requirements, the reclaim of weight, power & space and the actual relevance of the fuel consumption require a rethinking and a new vision of the automatic transmission concept and design. This is what SAPA has been working on for the last 12 years obtaining excellent technical and commercial results, a concept aimed at reducing the power losses of the conventional powershifting transmission eliminating the torque converter, reducing the spin losses -due to hydraulic pumps and friction discs-, and improving vehicle mobility on variable terrain situations as off-road
ABSTRACT As part of an Internal Research and Design effort to take existing disparate technologies and integrate them into a single autonomous vehicle to advance the state-of-the-art in unmanned ground vehicle autonomy, SwRI has developed a data representation and routing algorithm to deal with the complexities of interconnecting urban roadways and the static and dynamic hazards in such an environment. The program was designed to utilize data from a Route Network Definition File (RNDF), which contains a priori roadway network data. Using its known location and a given destination, the vehicle determines the shortest route to completion. If, during traversal of that route, the vehicle detects an obstacle in its path using its on-board sensors, it will dynamically re-route its path whether that requires changing lanes on a multiple lane road or turning around completely and finding a different route if the path is completely blocked
ABSTRACT U.S. Army Combat Capabilities Development Command (CCDC) Ground Vehicle Systems Center (GVSC) has been managing and developing a variety of autonomous systems throughout its existence. Two of the most important from the past decade include the Autonomous Mobility Appliqué System (AMAS) developed by Lockheed Martin Corporation (LMC) and the Robotic Technology Kernel (RTK) developed by GVSC in collaboration with DCS Corp and Southwest Research Institute (SwRI). Rather than continuing to develop and maintain two separate autonomous software systems, GVSC has decided to integrate any capabilities that were unique to AMAS into RTK and devote efforts to developing RTK going forward. The goal of integrating AMAS into RTK is to leverage the best features of each system. The process of this integration involves multiple steps. This paper describes the historical and current efforts involved in the integration of AMAS into RTK. Citation: D. Pirozzo, J.P. Hecker, A. Dickinson, T
ABSTRACT Off-road autonomous navigation poses a challenging problem, as the surrounding terrain is usually unknown, the support surface the vehicle must traverse cannot be considered flat, and environmental features (such as vegetation and water) make it difficult to estimate the support surface elevation. This paper will focus on Robotic Research’s suite of off-road autonomous planning and obstacle avoidance tools. Specifically, this paper will provide an overview of our terrain detection system, which utilizes advanced LADAR processing techniques to provide an estimate of the surface. Additionally, it will describe the kino-dynamic off-road planner which can, in real-time, calculate the optimal route, taking into account the support surface, obstacles sensed in the environment, and more. Finally, the paper will explore how these technologies have been applied to a wide variety of different robotic applications
ABSTRACT Currently, many small Army ground robots have mobility configurations containing tracks with sets of dual or quad flipper configurations. Many of these robots include the iRobot PackBot, Talon, and Dragon Runner. While the preceding robotic designs have allowed these robots to navigate over obstacles and across low traction environments, an increasing need for agile robotic platforms in complex environments involving subterranean and urban structure missions will be critical in the future. Therefore, a new mobility system for dismounted ground robots is being researched to aid in the exploration, mapping, and identification by targets of interest for dense urban environments. This paper discusses one possibility for a new small CRS-I sized ground robot mobility system that is inspired by the rocker-bogie designs of the Mars rover systems. Citation: Timothy Pietrzyk, Ty Valascho “Robotic Rocker-Bogie Mechanism Prototype”, In Proceedings of the Ground Vehicle Systems Engineering
In the realm of low-altitude flight power systems, such as electric vertical take-off and landing (eVTOL), ensuring the safety and optimal performance of batteries is of utmost importance. Lithium (Li) plating, a phenomenon that affects battery performance and safety, has garnered significant attention in recent years. This study investigates the intricate relationship between Li plating and the growth profile of cell thickness in Li-ion batteries. Previous research often overlooked this critical aspect, but our investigation reveals compelling insights. Notably, even during early stage of capacity fade (~ 5%), Li plating persists, leading to a remarkable final cell thickness growth exceeding 20% at an alarming 80% capacity fade. These findings suggest the potential of utilizing cell thickness growth as a novel criterion for qualifying and selecting cells, in addition to the conventional measure of capacity degradation. Monitoring the growth profile of cell thickness can enhance the
ABSTRACT Seasonality plays a key role in altering the terrain of many military operating environments. Since seasonality has such a large impact on the terrain, it needs to be properly accounted for in vehicle dynamics models. This work outlines a variety of static and dynamic seasonal terrain conditions and their impacts on vehicle mobility in an austere region of Europe. Overall the vehicles performed the best in the dry season condition. The thaw season condition had the most drastic impact on mobility with all but the heavy tracked vehicle being almost completely NOGO in the region. Overall, the heavy tracked vehicle had the best performance in all terrain conditions. These results highlight the importance of incorporating seasonal impacts on terrain into NRMM or any vehicle dynamics model. Future work will focus on collecting more data to improve the empirical relationships between vehicles and seasonal terrain conditions, thereby allowing for more accurate speed predictions
ABSTRACT This work investigates the effects of obstacle uncertainty on the speed, distance, and feasibility of a planned traversal path. Simulation results for artificial and real-world environments are used to numerically quantify how geometric uncertainty within a map affects path traversal cost. A significant outcome of this research is the discovery of a relationship between increasing uncertainty and path cost. As obstacle uncertainty increases, previously planned routes can become infeasible as they effectively become blocked off due to uncertainty in the obstacle geometry. This paper illustrates a method that can serve to increase the speed, simplicity, and reliability of path planning, while allowing uncertainty to be included in the mobility analysis. Citation: S. Tau, S. Brennan, K. Reichard, J. Pentzer, D. Gorsich, “The Effects of Obstacle Dimensional Uncertainty on Path Planning in Cluttered Environments”, In Proceedings of the Ground Vehicle Systems Engineering and
ABSTRACT The NATO Reference Mobility Model (NRMM) is an empirically based tool developed to facilitate comparisons between vehicle design candidates and to assess their mobility under specific mission profiles. It was originally established in the 1960s and 1970s, during a time when modern computational methods were in their infancy. Since its initial development, the NRMM has been revised and updated several times, but there has always been a deficiency – a thorough understanding of the vehicle capabilities for each mission profile. With the advent of modern simulation tools, coupled with the latest in data visualization and analytics, a new generation of mobility models may be built that cannot only assess a vehicle’s mobility, but also understand its extended range in various soil types, and more specific terrains or operational conditions. This presentation will discuss the capabilities of advanced simulation and visualization software and their ability to affect how mission
ABSTRACT To address the need for rapid capture of terrain profiles, and changes in terrain, researchers from Michigan Tech demonstrated a UAS collection system, during a live exercise, supported by the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s (NATO) Science and Technology Organization (STO). The UAS collection system was deployed to provide high resolution topography (resolution less than 1 cm) with a terrain collection rate greater than 1 meter per second and results were processed within minutes. The resulting topography is of sufficient quality to demonstrate that the technique can be applied to update mobility models, as well as the detection of traverse by ground vehicles
Yaw control for aircraft using the rudder faces challenges in resisting fast time-varying uncertainty due to the relatively slower response of the rudder. In hybrid unmanned aerial vehicles equipped with both rudders and rotors, the introduction of powered yaw control offers novel solutions for addressing fast time-varying uncertainty by leveraging the quicker response of rotors compared to traditional rudders. This paper presents a hierarchical yaw control approach for hybrid unmanned aerial vehicles, comprising a nominal control for rudders to achieve the desired yaw tracking and a constrained powered yaw control for rotors to resist fast time-varying uncertainty. Given the constrained amplitude of powered yaw control, it is imperative that the designed auxiliary input guarantees adherence to its constraint. Firstly, a nonlinear control for nominal hybrid unmanned aerial vehicle system is formulated to deal with the nonlinearity model, rendering a modest nominal control for rudders
This paper explores the groundbreaking applications of plasma propulsion engines and advanced nanomaterials in low-altitude aircraft, addressing the challenges and recent technological advancements that make such applications feasible. Traditional space plasma thrusters operate effectively in near-vacuum conditions by taking advantage of the ease of plasma ignition at low pressures. However, these thrusters face significant difficulties when operated at near-atmospheric pressures found in low-altitude environments, where plasma ignition is challenging. This paper highlights recent breakthroughs in high-pressure plasma glow discharge technology and the integration of nanomaterials, which together enable the use of plasma propulsion engines in low-altitude aircraft. These innovations offer substantial advantages over conventional engines, including higher efficiency, reduced emissions, and the potential to fundamentally change the propulsion systems of low-altitude aircraft
ABSTRACT A framework for generation of reliability-based stochastic off-road mobility maps is developed to support the Next Generation NATO Reference Mobility Model (NG-NRMM) using full stochastic knowledge of terrain properties and modern complex terramechanics modelling and simulation capabilities. The framework is for carrying out uncertainty quantification and reliability assessment for Speed Made Good and GO/NO-GO decisions for the ground vehicle based on the input variability models of the terrain elevation and soil property parameters. To generate the distribution of the slope at given point, realizations of the elevation raster are generated using the normal distribution. For the soil property parameters, such as cohesion, friction and bulk density, the min and max values obtained from geotechnical databases for each of the soil types are used to generate the normal distribution with a 99% confidence value range. In the framework, the ranges of terramechanics input parameters
ABSTRACT In 2014, a NATO Applied Vehicle Technology (AVT) Exploratory Team 148 (ET-148) was formed to explore the development of an improved Next-Generation NATO Reference Mobility Model (NG-NRMM)[1]. A development path forward was identified and initiated in a subsequent NATO research task group (AVT-248) to implement ET-148 recommendations. One key area for improvement was the vehicle-terrain interaction (Terramechanics) models defining important performance metrics for off-road performance in differing soils, and environmental conditions. The near term implementation focuses on existing “Simple” Terramechanics models as a practical improvement to the incumbent NRMM Cone Index (CI) empirically based method, without requiring the computational power of the large scale complex discrete element model (DEM) methods that are the targeted long term solution. Practical approaches and limitations to the implementation of these existing Simple Terramechanics models in 3D vehicle models are
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