WO2011082606A1

WO2011082606A1 - Judging method for soiling of dust sensor, wiping system and cleaning robot

Info

Publication number: WO2011082606A1
Application number: PCT/CN2010/078764
Authority: WO
Inventors: 汤进举
Original assignee: 泰怡凯电器(苏州)有限公司
Priority date: 2010-01-07
Filing date: 2010-11-16
Publication date: 2011-07-14
Also published as: CN102121900A

Abstract

A method for judging soiling of a dust sensor (1), a wiping system and a cleaning robot are provided. The dust sensor (1) includes a pair of light signaling elements (51, 52) disposed on both sides of a dust channel (12), to emit and receive light signals respectively. Each light transmission plate (3) is disposed on the side close to the dust channel (12) of each light signaling element (51, 52) to block dust and protect the dust sensor (1). The method for judging soiling of the dust sensor comprises: making analog/digital conversion to actual signals received by the dust sensor (1); calculating an arithmetic average value; determining that the light transmission plate (3) of the dust sensor (1) should be wiped if the calculated arithmetic average value was less than a preset value. Due to this, the soiling level of the light transmission plate (3) of the dust sensor (1) is determined in real time, and a wiping mechanism (301) of the wiping system for the dust sensor (1) can be automatically actuated to wipe the light transmission plate (3).

Description

Method for judging dust sensor pollution, wiping system, and cleaning robot

The invention relates to a method for judging the degree of contamination of a light-transmissive plate of a dust sensor, a dust sensor self-induction wiping system applying the pollution degree judging method, in particular, a smart cleaning robot with the self-induction wiping system. Background technique

Among the existing smart cleaning robot products and related technologies, most of the smart cleaning robots cannot autonomously perceive the dust in the cleaning area. As described in US Patent No. 2003025472, when a small area in the cleaning area needs special cleaning, the user needs to place the cleaning robot at the approximate center of the small area, and select a fixed point cleaning mode for the robot, the robot will be in advance Clean up under the set conditions. Although this method can solve the need for small area cleaning, but it needs human intervention, the robot's intelligent effect is not perfect.

In view of the above situation, there is a technologically improved intelligent cleaning robot that can sense and recognize dust in the cleaning area through a dust sensor. When the amount of dust is large, the robot automatically cleans the cleaning area in the cleaning area, that is, the robot is small. Regular or irregular cleaning in the area to improve cleaning efficiency. The working principle of the dust sensor is mainly to realize the induction and recognition of dust through infrared induction. Usually, a pair of optical signal components are arranged on both sides of the dust passage inside the robot, one for emitting infrared rays and the other for sensing infrared rays. A pair of dust sensors. Moreover, a light-transmitting plate is disposed on each side of the optical signal component near the dust passage, which can protect the dust sensor, and can shield the dust of the dust sensor without hindering the light emission and reception of the sensor. When dust is introduced into the dust passage, the infrared induction between the two optical signal elements is disturbed and weakened. The more dust, the weaker the infrared signal received by the sensing element, so the robot can determine the amount of dust in the cleaning area by the intensity of the infrared sensing signal.

However, since the robot itself is a cleaning device, the work performed is to clean the dust, so the light-transmissive plate of the dust sensor is inevitably more or less dusty, and the dust on the light-transmitting plate of the dust sensor accumulates. At a certain amount, the infrared induction between the above two optical signal components will be affected, and the infrared signal will become weak. At this time, regardless of the working environment, the robot will mistakenly think that the cleaning area is dirty, and thus has been The area is cleaned. Summary of the invention In view of the above problems, an object of the present invention is to provide a method for judging the degree of contamination of a light-transmitting plate of a dust sensor, which can determine the degree of contamination of the light-transmitting plate of the dust sensor in real time, thereby starting the wiping mechanism of the dust sensor wiping system in time, thereby Always maintain the sensitivity of the dust sensor detection.

The object of the present invention is to provide a dust sensor self-induction wiping system, which uses the above method to monitor and judge the pollution degree of the light sensor transparent plate in real time, and according to the judgment result, automatically activates the dust sensor wiping mechanism to transmit light to the dust sensor. The board is wiped to keep the dust sensor transparent plate clean, thus ensuring accurate judgment of the amount of dust by the dust sensor.

It is still another object of the present invention to provide a smart cleaning robot that adopts the above-described judging method and has the above-described dust sensor self-inductive wiping system, thereby enabling the smart cleaning robot to maintain the dust sensor in any cleaning mode. The cleaning of the light-transmitting plate ensures that the dust sensor accurately judges the amount of dust, so that the intelligent cleaning robot can always work normally.

Specifically, the present invention provides a method for judging the degree of contamination of a light-transmissive plate of a dust sensor, wherein the dust sensor includes a pair of optical signal components for transmitting and receiving optical signals, and each optical signal component is provided with a light-transmitting plate. The dust sensor is used to block the dust protection. The dust sensor is determined by the analog/digital conversion of the actual signal received by the dust sensor, and the arithmetic mean is obtained. When the value Y2 is smaller than a predetermined value, it is determined that the light-transmitting plate of the dust sensor needs to be wiped.

Further, when the obtained arithmetic mean value Y2 is smaller than the first threshold value and larger than the second threshold value, it is determined that the degree of contamination of the light-transmitting plate of the dust sensor is small, and the time required for wiping is short; when the obtained arithmetic mean value Y2 is smaller than the first When the threshold is two, it is determined that the light-transmitting plate of the dust sensor is highly polluted, and the time required for wiping is long.

Further, at the same time, the AC change amount of the actual signal received by the dust sensor is amplified, and when the amplified change amount value Y1 is larger than a predetermined value, it is judged that the amount of dust is large, and the spot cleaning is required.

The present invention also provides a dust sensor self-inductive wiping system, comprising: a sensor unit having a dust sensor composed of a pair of transmitting and receiving optical signal elements for detecting the amount of dust, and each of the optical signal elements is provided with a transparent a light board for shielding a dust protection dust sensor; a wiping mechanism for wiping the light-transmitting plate of the dust sensor; and a control unit for receiving a signal from the dust sensor, using the above-mentioned dust sensor to determine the degree of contamination of the light-transmissive plate, real-time The monitoring determines the degree of contamination of the light-transmitting plate of the dust sensor, and according to the result of the determination, issues a command to the wiping mechanism to cause the wiping mechanism to wipe the light-transmitting plate of the dust sensor.

In the above dust sensor self-inductive wiping system, the wiping mechanism includes a wiping member disposed on one side of the light transmissive plate, and one of the translucent plate or the wiping member is coupled to a motor shaft of a motor, and is subjected to a motor. A relative displacement between the translucent plate and the wiper is driven to wipe off the dust adhering to the inner surface of the translucent plate. The light transmissive plate may be fixed to the motor shaft to drive the light transmissive plate to be rotated by the motor. In addition, the motor shaft can be fixedly connected to the light-transmitting plates on both sides to simultaneously drive the two light-transmitting plates.

In addition, the wiping member may be fixed, the one side of the light transmissive plate is provided with a rack, the front end of the motor shaft is provided with a gear, the rack and the gear are meshed, and the translucent plate is driven by the motor. Make a reciprocating motion.

The invention also provides a smart cleaning robot, comprising a robot body, a sensor unit, a driving unit, a walking unit, a control unit, a cleaning mechanism, the control unit controls the cleaning mechanism to operate, and controls the driving unit, The driving unit drives the walking unit to walk, wherein the sensor unit determines the degree of contamination of the light-transmitting plate of the dust sensor by using the above-mentioned judging method.

In addition, the smart cleaning robot further includes the above-described dust sensor self-induction wiping system.

The beneficial effects of the invention are as follows: by real-time judging the degree of contamination of the light-transmitting plate of the dust sensor, thereby automatically starting the wiping mechanism of the dust sensor wiping system in time, wiping the light-transmitting plate of the dust sensor, and keeping the light-transmitting plate of the dust sensor clean In order to effectively maintain the sensitivity of the dust sensor detection, the intelligent cleaning robot can ensure the accurate determination of the amount of dust by the dust sensor in any cleaning mode, so that the intelligent cleaning robot can always work normally. DRAWINGS

Figure 1 is a schematic view of the appearance of the smart cleaning robot;

2 is a schematic structural view of a smart cleaning robot;

Figure 3 is a partial enlarged view of a portion A in Figure 2;

4 is a block diagram of a composition of a dust sensor self-induction wiping system of the present invention;

Figure 5 is a partial cross-sectional view showing the first embodiment of the dust sensor wiping mechanism in the dust sensor self-induction wiping system of the present invention;

Figure 6 is a cross-sectional view taken along line A-A of Figure 5;

Figure Ί is a partial cross-sectional view showing a second embodiment of the dust sensor wiping mechanism in the dust sensor self-induction wiping system of the present invention;

Figure 8 is a cross-sectional view taken along line C-C of Figure 7;

9 is a partial cross-sectional view showing a third embodiment of a dust sensor wiping mechanism in a dust sensor self-induction wiping system according to the present invention;

Figure 10 is a graph of actual signal values received by the dust sensor; FIG. 11 is a graph showing a change amount of a dust sensor signal obtained by amplifying an AC variation amount of the actual signal value curve of FIG. 10; FIG.

Figure 12 is a graph showing the average value of the dust sensor signal obtained by arithmetically averaging the actual signal value curve of Figure 10;

Figure 13 is a circuit diagram of the dust sensor hardware system;

Figure 14 is a flow chart showing the operation of the dust sensor self-induction wiping system of the present invention. detailed description

The technical solution of the present invention will be described in detail below with reference to the accompanying drawings and taking a smart cleaning robot as an example. Figure 1 is a schematic view of the appearance of a smart cleaning robot. Figure 2 is a schematic view of the structure of the intelligent cleaning robot. Figure

3 is a partial enlarged view of part A in Fig. 2. Fig. 4 is a block diagram showing the composition of the dust sensor self-induction wiping system of the present invention. 3 and 4, the dust sensor self-inductive wiping system of the present invention comprises: a sensor unit 101 having a dust sensor 1 composed of a pair of transmitting and receiving optical signal elements for detecting the amount of dust entering the dust passage 12. The wiping mechanism 301 is for wiping the dust sensor light-transmitting plate; and the control unit 201 receives the signal provided by the dust sensor 1 and issues a command to the dust sensor wiping mechanism 301 to cause the dust sensor wiping mechanism 301 to perform the wiping action. The control unit 201 is composed of an integrated circuit component such as a CPU, a microcontroller, and a memory. The control unit 201 can be integrated into an integrated control unit, while controlling the cleaning mechanism 401 to perform a cleaning operation and controlling the wiping mechanism 301 to perform a wiping action; It may be constituted by a control subunit of several individual modules, for example, a unit that controls the cleaning mechanism 401 to perform a cleaning operation and a unit that controls the wiping mechanism 301 to perform a wiping operation.

As shown in FIGS. 2 and 3, on both sides of the dust passage 12 of the smart cleaning robot, there are respectively provided a light-emitting element 51 and a light-receiving element 52 (see FIG. 5) which constitute dust for detecting the amount of dust entering the dust passage. Sensor 1. A light-transmitting plate 3 is disposed on the side of the light-emitting element 51 and the light-receiving element 52 adjacent to the dust passage 12, respectively, for protecting the pair of optical signal elements, that is, the dust sensor, from dust. The dust sensor wiping mechanism 301 is disposed inside the dust transmitting plate of the dust sensor, that is, near the dust passage 12 side.

Several dust sensor wiping mechanisms in the dust sensor self-inductive wiping system of the present invention will now be described with reference to Figs. 5 to 9.

Figure 5 is a first embodiment of a dust sensor wiping mechanism in a dust sensor self-inductive wiping system of the present invention. Figure 6 is a cross-sectional view taken along line AA of Figure 5. A through hole 13 is formed in the side wall 11 of the dust passage 12, and a wiper 2 is fixedly disposed in the through hole 13. The wiper 2 is disposed on the light transmissive plate 3 and the side wall 11 Between and adhered to the inner surface of the light-transmitting plate 3. The inside of the wiper 2 is provided with a hole 21 for allowing light emitted from the light-emitting element 51 to pass through the hole 21 and be sensed by the light-receiving element 52. The wiper 2 can also be in the shape of a straight strip as long as it does not block the normal transmission of the optical signal. The wiper 2 can be made of an easily wipeable material such as sponge or wool. A hole is provided in the center of the cover plate 4 and the light-transmitting plate 3, and the motor shaft 61 of the motor 6 is inserted into the hole of the light-transmitting plate 3 through the cover plate 4, and is fixed to the light-transmitting plate 3. The inner side of the light-transmitting plate 3 has a boss rotatably supported on the side wall 11. When the motor 6 is started, the rotation of the motor shaft 61 causes the light-transmitting plate 3 to rotate about the motor axis. Since the light-transmitting plates 3 are disposed on both sides of the passage, the two light-transmitting plates 3 are respectively driven by one motor. When the two motors 6 rotate, the motor shaft 61 drives the light-transmitting plate 3 to rotate. Since the wiper 2 is fixed, the light-transmitting plate 3 and the wiper 2 will move relative to each other, thereby adhering. The dust on the inner surface of the light-transmitting plate 3 is wiped off.

Fig. 7 is a second embodiment of the dust sensor wiping mechanism in the dust sensor self-induction wiping system of the present invention. Figure 8 is a cross-sectional view taken along line C-C of Figure 7. The dust sensor wiping mechanism of the second embodiment is different from the dust sensor wiping mechanism of the first embodiment in that the light transmissive plate 3 has a rectangular shape, and one side thereof is provided with a rack 31, and the front end of the motor shaft 61 A gear 62 is provided, the rack 31 and the gear 62 are meshed, and one side of the light-transmitting plate 3 is further provided with a spring 7 for returning the light-transmitting plate 3, so that the light-transmitting plate 3 is driven by the motor 6. The latter is reciprocated perpendicular to the motor axis. When the wiping is completed, the spring 7 returns the light-transmitting plate 3 to the initial position against the resistance generated by the gear rack fit. Of course, you can also directly control the motor to reverse the rotation without using the spring 7. By the rotation of the motor, the rack and pinion cooperate to linearly move the light-transmitting plate 3. Since the wiper 2 is fixed, the light-transmitting plate 3 and the wiper 2 will move relative to each other, so that the light-transmitting plate 3 will adhere to the light. The dust on the inner surface of the plate 3 is wiped off.

Fig. 9 is a third embodiment of the dust sensor wiping mechanism in the dust sensor self-induction wiping system of the present invention. The dust sensor wiping mechanism of the third embodiment is different from the dust sensor wiping mechanism of the first embodiment in that the motor shaft 61 passes through the dust passage 12 and is fixedly connected to the light-transmitting plates 3 on both sides. In order to drive the two light-transmitting plates 3 at the same time, one motor is omitted. And the motor can also be replaced by the main motor of the intelligent cleaning robot.

In addition, the dust sensor wiping mechanism in the self-inductive wiping system of the present invention can also match the wiping member 2 with the motor shaft 61 of the motor 6, and is driven by the motor 6 to rotate or reciprocate, and the translucent plate 3 is set. In the corresponding fixed position. When the motor rotates, a relative movement between the light-transmitting plate 3 and the wiping member 2 is caused, thereby wiping off the dust adhering to the inner side surface of the light-transmitting plate 3.

Next, a method for judging the degree of contamination of the light-transmitting plate of the dust sensor of the present invention will be described with reference to FIGS. 10 to 13 Bright.

Figure 10 is an actual signal value curve received by the dust sensor of Figure 13, the horizontal axis of Figure 10 represents time (in seconds), and the vertical axis Y represents the actual signal value of the dust sensor (in millivolts) .

The actual signal value curve received by the dust sensor is affected by two aspects. On the one hand, it is the influence of the amount of dust from the ground. It is randomly fluctuating up and down. From a macro perspective, it does not change regularly with time; another The aspect is the influence of pollution from the light-transmitting plate, which changes regularly with time. The longer the time, the more the pollution level increases. Therefore, in summary, the actual signal value curve shows a tendency to fluctuate locally and generally decrease.

By amplifying the AC variation of the actual signal received by the dust sensor as shown in the hardware circuit configuration shown in FIG. 13, a variation value curve as shown in FIG. 11 is obtained, and the horizontal axis of FIG. 11 represents time (in seconds). ), the vertical axis Y1 represents the amount of change in the dust sensor signal (in millivolts). Under normal circumstances, the variation value curve fluctuates up and down within a certain range, reflecting the change of the amount of dust entering the dust passage of the intelligent cleaning robot at each moment, that is, indirectly reflecting the amount of dust on the ground, by means of the The value can detect the amount of dust on the ground in time. By amplifying the processed signal strength, the condition of the actual signal value can be observed more clearly and effectively, thereby controlling the operation of the cleaning system according to the change of the variation magnitude curve in a short time.

On the other hand, the actual signal received by the dust sensor is passed through the hardware circuit structure as shown in FIG.

After the A/D conversion, arithmetic mean processing is performed to obtain an average value curve as shown in Fig. 12. The horizontal axis of Fig. 12 represents time (unit: "second"), and the vertical axis Y2 represents the average value of the dust sensor signal ( The unit is "millivolt"). The average curve shows a gradual decline, reflecting that the light-transmitting plate is gradually being contaminated, and the gradually decreasing trend is mainly determined by the degree of contamination of the light-transmitting plate. The smaller the arithmetic mean Y2, the more polluted the dust sensor is. The wiping of the light-transmitting plate is controlled by the result of the change of the average value curve over a long period of time.

艮卩, if the arithmetic mean Y2 is less than a certain preset value, it is judged that there is much dust attached to the light-transmitting plate of the dust sensor, and the light-transmitting plate is highly polluted, and the light-transmitting plate needs to be wiped. The preset value can be set according to actual needs, and usually the empirical value obtained by the manufacturer through experiments is pre-stored in the corresponding memory.

Next, the operation of the dust sensor self-inductive wiping system of the present invention will be described with reference to FIG. After the smart cleaning robot starts working, the dust sensor of the present invention detects the amount of dust in the dust passage 12 from the dust sensor 1 in the induction wiping system to obtain an actual signal value (step S l ).

Amplifying the AC variation of the actual signal value received by the dust sensor, and performing A/D conversion to obtain a variation value of the dust sensor signal (step S2), the value being input to the control unit 201 (micro controller (MCU)) . When the magnitude of the change in the dust sensor signal is greater than the first predetermined value (YES in step S3), it is considered that the amount of dust detected by the dust sensor is large, and the spot cleaning operation is performed. At this time, the control unit 201 issues an instruction to activate the cleaning mechanism 401 to perform spot cleaning on the ground (step S4). The first preset value may be set according to actual needs, and is usually an empirical value obtained by the manufacturer through experiments, and is pre-stored in the memory of the control unit.

At the same time, the A/D conversion is performed on the actual signal value received by the dust sensor, and then input to the control unit 201 (micro controller (MCU)) to perform arithmetic mean processing to obtain an average value of the dust sensor signal (step S5). ).

When the average value of the dust sensor signal is less than the second predetermined value (YES in step S6), it is considered that the dust of the dust sensor translucent plate 3 is excessively attached, and the light transmissive plate is highly polluted, and wiping is performed. action. At this time, the control unit 201 issues an instruction to activate the dust sensor wiping mechanism 301 to wipe the dust sensor translucent plate 3 (step S7). The second preset value may also be set according to actual needs and stored in advance in the memory of the control unit.

Further, the dust sensor self-inductive wiping system of the present invention can determine the length of the wiping time according to the severity of the contamination of the dust sensor of the dust sensor. For example, two thresholds may be set (the first threshold is greater than the second threshold). When the Y2 value (arithmetic mean) is less than the first threshold and greater than the second threshold, the wiping mechanism starts wiping, and the wiping time is shorter, such as wiping 2 Seconds; when the Y2 value is less than the second threshold, the pollution is aggravated, and the wiping time can be extended, such as wiping for 5 seconds. The first threshold and the second threshold are also set according to actual needs, and are respectively stored in the corresponding memory in advance.

In addition, the intelligent cleaning robot can determine whether the wiper of the dust sensor needs to be wiped and the length of the wipe time, depending on the output of the dust sensor output during any cleaning mode. The "execution of the spot cleaning operation" and the "execution of the wiping action" can be performed simultaneously, or the "cleaning operation" can be temporarily stopped by the intelligent cleaning robot. In fact, during the use of the intelligent cleaning robot, since the dust on the light-transmissive board of the dust sensor is very short, the wiping work can be completed in the second-order time unit, so the "fixed-point cleaning action" and the "wiping dust sensor are transparent." The action of the light plate is performed synchronously or separately, and has no effect on the robot work itself.

When the wiping action is completed, the process returns to step S1, and it is judged based on the average value of the actual signals received by the current dust sensor whether it is necessary to wipe again. If it is necessary to wipe again, the wiping action is performed again (step S7).

Claims

Claim

A method for judging the degree of contamination of a light-transmissive plate of a dust sensor, the dust sensor (1) comprising a pair of optical signal components (51, 52) for transmitting and receiving optical signals, respectively, each optical signal component (51, 52) Each of the light-transmitting plates (3) is provided for shielding the dust-protecting dust sensor, and the method for determining the degree of contamination of the light-transmitting plate of the dust sensor is:

After the actual signal received by the dust sensor is converted by analog/digital conversion, the arithmetic average processing is performed, and when the obtained arithmetic mean value (Y2) is less than a predetermined value, the light-transmitting plate of the dust sensor is determined (3) ) Need to wipe.

2. The method for judging the degree of contamination of a light-transmitting plate of a dust sensor according to claim 1, wherein when the obtained arithmetic mean value (Y2) is greater than the first threshold and less than the second threshold, the dust sensor is determined to be transparent. The light board (3) is less polluted and requires a shorter wiping time; when the calculated arithmetic mean value (Y2) is less than the second threshold value, it is determined that the light transmissive plate (3) of the dust sensor is highly polluted and needs to be Wipe for a long time.

The method for judging the degree of contamination of a light-transmitting plate of a dust sensor according to claim 1 or 2, wherein the amount of change in the AC signal received by the dust sensor is simultaneously amplified, and the value of the change after the amplification When (Y1) is larger than a predetermined value, it is judged that the amount of dust is large, and fixed-point cleaning is required.

4. A dust sensor self-induction wiping system, comprising:

The sensor unit (101) has a dust sensor (1) composed of a pair of transmitting and receiving optical signal elements (51, 52) for detecting the amount of dust, and each of the optical signal elements (51, 52) is provided with a transparent a light board (3) for shielding a dust protection dust sensor;

a wiping mechanism (301) for wiping the light transmissive plate of the dust sensor (3);

a control unit (201) receiving a signal from the dust sensor (1);

The control unit (201) utilizes the method for judging the degree of contamination of the light-transmitting plate of the dust sensor according to any one of claims 1-2, and monitors and determines the pollution degree of the light-transmitting plate (3) of the dust sensor in real time, and Based on the result of the judgment, a command is issued to the wiping mechanism (301) to cause the wiping mechanism (301) to wipe the light-transmitting plate (3) of the dust sensor.

5. The dust sensor self-inductive wiping system according to claim 4, wherein the wiping machine The structure (301) includes a wiper (2) disposed on the side of the light-transmitting plate (3), one of the light-transmitting plate (3) or the wiper (2) and a motor shaft of a motor (6) (61) Matching, the relative displacement between the translucent plate (3) and the wiper (2) is driven by the motor (6), and the dust adhering to the inner surface of the translucent plate (3) is wiped off.

6. The dust sensor self-inductive wiping system according to claim 5, wherein the light transmissive plate

(3) Fixed to the motor shaft (61) so that the light-transmitting plate (3) is driven by the motor (6) for rotary motion.

The dust sensor self-inductive wiping system according to claim 5, wherein the motor shaft (61) and the light transmissive plates (3) on both sides are fixedly connected to simultaneously drive the two Light transmissive plate (3).

The dust sensor self-inductive wiping system according to claim 5, wherein the wiping member (2) is fixed, and one side of the light transmissive plate (3) is provided with a rack (31). The front end of the motor shaft (61) is provided with a gear (62), and the rack (31) and the gear (62) are meshed, and the light transmissive plate (3) is driven by the motor (6) to reciprocate.

9. A smart cleaning robot, comprising a robot body, a sensor unit, a driving unit, a walking unit, a control unit, a cleaning mechanism, the control unit controls the operation of the cleaning mechanism, and controls the driving unit, wherein the driving unit is Driving the walking unit to walk, characterized in that

The sensor unit determines the degree of contamination of the light-transmitting plate (3) of the dust sensor by the determining method according to any one of claims 1-3.

The smart cleaning robot according to claim 9, wherein the smart cleaning robot further comprises the dust sensor self-inductive wiping system according to any one of claims 4-7.