Vision-Controlled Painting Robot - Repainting Soccer Fields

During my Bachelor studies at the Technical University of Denmark I focused on automation and control through elective courses in addition to the courses of Electrical Engineering. My Bachelor thesis delat with the design, implementation and control of a automated solution for repainting outdoor playing fields.

Download: Vision-Controlled Painting Robot
Duration: Februar 2010 - June 2010.
Media:

• DIRA: DIRA is a Danish Robot Network (https://dira.dk/) which in 2010 posted this article about my project; link (only in Danish).
• Robocluster: Robocluster is an innovation network (http://robocluster.dk/). Their article about the project can be found here; link (only in Danish).

Description:

This project considers repainting of outdoor playing fields, which have to be repainted often using a tedious process. The work was carried out as my Bachelor thesis, and was a case study conducted for Kløvermarkens Forende Boldklubber (KFB). The fields are painted with a reference to an existing stripe or a white rope, which is used when painting new fields. The automated process therefore builds on existing techniques carried out by trained personnel and does not introduce additional steps in the process.

This project is about the design, development and construction of an autonomous painting robot. The painting robot is mounted on the side or the front of a golf car and is to fine-tune the position of the painting gear so that it is placed directly over the existing stripe. The tasks of the driver is reduced to keeping the car approximately parallel to the stripe or rope. Previously the quality of the repainting was determined directly by the drivers ability to stay on the line. Now the car just has to be approximately close as the robot controls the finer adjustments of the painting apparatus.

The project consists of three parts; The mechanical part of the robot, the image processing and the control of the robot:

• The mechanical part of the robot is constructed using plain bearings and a toothed belt.
• The image processing identifies and localizes the stripes or the rope from pictures taken with a mounted camera.
• The control of the robot is simulated in Simulink, where a high precision regulator is designed.

By introducing the constructed painting robot in the painting-process, it will make it easier to gain accurate painting and make the work process less demanding for the KFB employees.

Pictures: