Automated warehousing using robotic forklifts or other material handling vehicles

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-2021035057-A1
Application number	US-202017074362-A
Country	US
Kind code	A1
Filing date	Oct 19, 2020
Priority date	Sep 26, 2016
Publication date	Feb 4, 2021
Grant date	—

Abstract

Automated inventory management and material (or container) handling removes the requirement to operate fully automatically or all-manual using conventional task dedicated vertical storage and retrieval (S&R) machines. Inventory requests Automated vehicles plan their own movements to execute missions over a container yard, warehouse aisles or roadways, sharing this space with manually driven trucks. Automated units drive to planned speed limits, manage their loads (stability control), stop, go, and merge at intersections according human driving rules, use on-board sensors to identify static and dynamic obstacles, and human traffic, and either avoid them or stop until potential collision risk is removed. They identify, localize, and either pick-up loads (pallets, container, etc.) or drop them at the correctly demined locations. Systems without full automation can also implement partially automated operations (for instance load pick-up and drop), and can assure inherently safe manually operated vehicles (i.e., trucks that do not allow collisions).

First claim

1 . A material delivery system, comprising:
an inventory server associated with a material handling facility; at least one mobile platform configured to receive material delivery instructions from the inventory server, and wherein the material delivery instructions include the identification of material pick-up and material drop-off locations inside and outside of the material handling facility; wherein the mobile platform includes multiple sensors and access to stored maps enabling the mobile platform to (a) determine its location inside and outside of the material handling facility, and (b) navigate unimpeded within and outside facilities to fulfill the material delivery requests; wherein, when the mobile platform determines that its location is proximate to one of the load pick-up locations, the mobile platform is operate to robotically acquire a load; and when the mobile platform determines that its location is proximate to one of the load drop-off locations, the mobile platform is operate to robotically deliver the load to the load drop-off location.

2 . The vehicle of claim 1 , wherein the multiple sensors comprise a combination of global positioning satellite (GPS) geolocation and inertial sensing.

3 . The vehicle of claim 1 , wherein video capture and processing apparatus are used to assist the mobile platform in determining its location within and outside of the facility.

4 . The vehicle of claim 3 , wherein the video capture and processing apparatus are operative to detect and identify computer-readable codes.

5 . The vehicle of claim 4 , wherein the computer-readable codes are barcodes.

6 . The vehicle of claim 3 , wherein the video capture and processing apparatus are operative to detect and identify objects to pick-up and locations at which to deliver objects within and outside of the facility.

7 . The vehicle of claim 1 , wherein the mobile platform is capable of autonomous, semi-autonomous and manual operation.

8 . The vehicle of claim 1 , wherein the mobile platform is a forklift.

9 . The vehicle of claim 1 , wherein the mobile platform is a material delivery truck.

10 . The vehicle of claim 1 , wherein the mobile platform is a material handling robot platform,

11 . The vehicle of claim 3 , wherein the includes the video capture and processing apparatus enables the vehicle to locate, engage, and manipulate loads for pick-up, delivery, stacking or destacking operations.

12 . The vehicle of claim 3 , wherein the video capture and processing apparatus is operative to identify one or more of the following:
load locations, load types, lot identifiers, and key pick-up or delivery locations.

13 . The vehicle of claim 3 , wherein the video capture and processing apparatus is operative to identify one or more of the following:
load pick-up openings, load edges and load top locations.

14 . The vehicle of claim 3 , wherein the video capture and processing apparatus is operative to identify one or more of the following:
travel lanes, roads, aisles, walls and shelving units.

15 . The vehicle of claim 3 , wherein the video capture and processing apparatus is operative to identify doors or other openings in walls or shelving units.

16 . The vehicle of claim 3 , wherein the video capture and processing apparatus is operative to target pick-and-place locations by identifying and locating templates or models.

17 . The vehicle of claim 1 , wherein the facility is a warehouse.

18 . The vehicle of claim 1 , wherein the facility is a manufacturing facility.

19 . The vehicle of claim 1 , wherein the facility is a facility for storage of material.

20 . The vehicle of claim 14 , where travel lanes and roads include 4 -way stops, 2 -way stops, merges from lower priority segments into higher priority segments while yielding to cross traffic, speed limits, destination locations, events such as loading/unloading or pick-up and delivery, or include other human-like driving rules to be obeyed.

Assignees

• Cybernet Systems Corp

Inventors

• Jacobus Charles J
• Beach Glenn J
• Rowe Steve
• Cohen Charles J

Classifications

• G06K19/06037

  multi-dimensional coding · CPC title

• B66F9/063

  Automatically guided · CPC title

• G06Q10/087 Primary

  Inventory or stock management, e.g. order filling, procurement or balancing against orders · CPC title

• G06K19/07758

  arrangements for adhering the record carrier to further objects or living beings, functioning as an identification tag · CPC title

• B66F9/0755

  Position control; Position detectors · CPC title