Autonomous Traversing across Floors Based on Vision for Reconfigurable Tracked Robot

We present a full-stack autonomous navigation system for a reconfigurable tracked robot in man-built environments, especially targeting the safe traversing in stairways. This system first uses A* algorithm to plan an initial path across the floor on a grid map. Then the staircase detection algorithm will continuously look for the staircase features from the environment. Once the staircase is detected, our motion strategy completes the staircase traversing, otherwise a follower based on dynamic window approach is used to follow this path. Finally, the low-level controller drives the motor to rotate to complete the cross-floor navigation task. Our method has been validated experimentally on a reconfigurable tracked robot. Compared to manual control by experienced professional operators, our approach enables the robot to complete the cross-floor traversing task more stably, smoothly and safely. Overall, this work combines the advantages of different algorithms in cross-floor navigation, improves the stability and adaptability of robots in different environments and provides important experience for future research.