Agent Fault-Tolerant Strategy in a Heterogeneous Triangular Formation

Heterogeneous formations are widely used in co-operation between Unmanned Ground Vehicles (UGVs) and Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs), like object tracking, load transportation, path planning, and inspection missions. The focus of this work is inspection systems involving long distances, which are susceptible to failures, which may come from the environment, communication, robot infrastructure and so on. Aiming at the efficiency, stability, and security of an inspection involving UGVs and UAVs, we propose fault-tolerant strategies using a triangular-shaped virtual structure. Two specific types of failures are addressed: battery discharge of the UAV and communication or mechanical failure of the UGV. A fault-tolerant strategy is proposed for each type of fault and experiments were carried out to validate the methodology presented through cooperation among the robots: Pioneer3DX, AR.Drone 2.0 and Bebop 2.