A Non-contact Ranging System That Can Recognize Several Scenes

A sensor system with scene recognition ability is proposed for the needs of amphibious robots. Firstly, based on theoretical analysis and the characteristics of related sensing technologies, a dual-sensor combination schedule of ultrasonic transducer (UT) and the laser-ranging (LR) module is selected to propose a kind of non-contact sensor (NCS) system. Adopting the LGT8F328P as the MCU, a handheld test platform is developed to verify the system under laboratory and outdoor conditions. The field test results show that the sensor system can select the appropriate sensor based on different scenes. The system can recognize rigid surfaces, waterbody, lawns and carpets. Also, the maximum error of the system's ranging result within a range of 500 mm is less than 8 mm, and the minimum recognition accuracy is greater than 75%. The system can run independently offline, and the working time is about 6 hours, which can satisfy the basic detection.