Automatically displaceable cleaning device

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10466358-B2
Application number	US-201515531774-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Dec 1, 2015
Priority date	Dec 15, 2014
Publication date	Nov 5, 2019
Grant date	Nov 5, 2019

Abstract

An automatically movable cleaning device, in particular an electric-motor-driven vacuuming and/or wiping robot, comprising a distance-measuring device for measuring the distance of the cleaning device from an object, wherein the distance-measuring device has an optical triangulation system, which has a light source, an optical filter, and a detector, which are arranged in such a way that light in a propagation direction, emitted by the light source, is first scattered by the object, wherein at least a portion of the scattered light is then spectrally filtered by means of the optical filter and wherein the filtered light is finally detected by the detector. For advantageous development, the optical filter according to the invention is a band-stop filter having a reflectivity of at least 90% with respect to at least one wavelength of the scattered light, and/or the optical filter is a band-pass filter, a reflector being arranged after the band-pass filter in the transmission direction, and/or the optical filter is a cut-off filter having a reflectivity of at least 90% with respect to at least one wavelength of the scattered light.

First claim

The invention claimed is:

1. An automatically displaceable cleaning device ( 1 ), with a distance measuring device ( 2 ) for measuring the distance of the cleaning device ( 1 ) from an object ( 3 ), wherein the distance measuring device ( 2 ) exhibits an optical triangulation system with a light source ( 4 ), an optical filter ( 5 ) and a detector ( 6 ), which are arranged in such a way that light emitted by the light source ( 4 ) in the propagation direction is first scattered by the object ( 3 ), wherein at least a portion of the scattered light is subsequently spectrally filtered by the optical filter ( 5 ), and wherein the filtered light is finally detected by the detector ( 6 ), wherein the optical filter ( 5 ) is a band stop filter with a reflectance of at least 90% in relation to at least one wavelength of the scattered light.

2. The cleaning device ( 1 ) according to claim 1 , wherein the triangulation system exhibits two detectors ( 6 , 7 ), wherein a first detector ( 6 ) is situated in a reflection direction relative to the optical filter ( 5 ), so as to detect a first light component ( 8 ) reflected by the optical filter ( 5 ), and wherein a second detector ( 7 ) is situated in a transmission direction relative to the optical filter ( 5 ), so as to detect a second light component ( 9 ) transmitted by the optical filter ( 5 ).

3. The cleaning device ( 1 ) according to claim 2 , wherein a reflector ( 10 ) is placed in a propagation direction of the light between the optical filter ( 5 ) and the second detector ( 7 ), which reflects the second light component ( 9 ) transmitted by the optical filter ( 5 ) to the second detector ( 7 ).

4. The cleaning device ( 1 ) according to claim 3 , wherein the reflector ( 10 ) is a band stop filter.

5. The cleaning device ( 1 ) according to claim 4 , wherein the mean frequency of the optical filter ( 5 ) corresponds to a wavelength of the light emitted by the light source ( 4 ), and wherein the mean frequency of the reflector ( 10 ) corresponds to a wavelength of the visible ambient light, wherein the mean frequency of the optical filter ( 5 ) does not correspond to any wavelength of the visible ambient light.

6. The cleaning device ( 1 ) according to claim 3 , wherein the reflector ( 10 ) exhibits a reflection spectrum that has a mean frequency deviating from the reflection spectrum of the optical filter ( 5 ).

7. The cleaning device ( 1 ) according to claim 1 , wherein the band stop filter is an interference mirror.

8. The cleaning device ( 1 ) according to one of the claim 1 , wherein the distance measuring device ( 2 ) exhibits only one circuit board ( 11 ) for the arrangement of both the light source ( 4 ) and the optical filter ( 5 ) and detector ( 6 , 7 ).

Assignees

• Vorwerk Co Interholding

Inventors

• Strang Benjamin

Classifications

• A47L9/30

  Arrangement of illuminating devices · CPC title

• G01S17/931

  of land vehicles · CPC title

• G01S7/4816

  of receivers alone · CPC title

• G01S7/4817

  relating to scanning · CPC title

• G02B5/26

  Reflecting filters (G02B5/28 takes precedence) · CPC title