Market demand for a low cost, high-volume community-wide bin cleaning service drove the need for innovation. FreshBins vision involved deploying an industrial robot mounted on a truck to automate the bin pickup process. Putting robots on a truck to automate the process of collecting and cleaning commercial and domestic rubbish bins required innovation to locate the target bins in various open air environments.
Robotics for bin cleaning services
3D localization of bins
Industrial robots in a factory are securely attached to the floor and programmed to complete their assigned task. The truck robot moves relative to the target bin, and thus dynamic 3-dimensional programming was required to precisely locate a bin in 3-dimensions before it could be picked up. The FreshBins company contacted the firm Machinery Automation & Robotics (MAR). They accepted the challenge and selected the LMS111 laser scanner from SICK, as it provided the resolution and scanning accuracy necessary to support the 3-D robotics location and pickup function. Over a period of nine months, MAR worked exclusively with SICK scanners and FreshBins to solve and refine the 3-D robotic location and pickup technology which FreshBins has now patented.
FreshBins is continuing their R&D work with SICK in further refining the use of SICK scanning technologies in the refinement of the bin cleaning solution and other alternate applications of the robotic innovations.
- Product information: LMS100, LMS111
- More solutions: Positioning
- Customer information: FreshBins
