A Survey on Traction System Development of Automated Guided Vehicles

Abstract

Automated guided vehicles (AGVs) have been part of every production plant because of the increasing demand for production speed, efficiency and production throughput. Therefore, an AGV is part of the automation system in production plants. In that sense, AGVs can be considered as programmable and configurable robots because every production has specific AGV performance requirements such as AGV speed, positioning accuracy, maximum load, maximum speed, and safety standards. In this study, comprehensive system parameters are studied to provide a guideline to researchers and application engineers working on AGVs. Regarding the traction system, energy efficiency solutions, failure risks of AGV motors, and electrical design issues are the dedicated sections in this paper. On a global scale, cyber security and climate change are also two critical parameters that should be considered for component specifications of every AGV. As a case study in automotive production plants, an AGV developed in Ford Otosan R&D Center is presented. To this end, this paper is intended to be a design guideline considering the relationship between the upper-level software interacting with the environment and lower-level electrical components exposed to mechanical load.