Robot vacuum cleaners: application and history

Robot vacuum cleaner is a vacuum cleaner equipped with artificial intelligence and designed for automatic cleaning of premises. Belongs to the class of household robots and intelligent household appliances for a smart home.

The robot vacuum cleaner can perform cleaning according to a specific schedule, or at the command of the user. During cleaning, the robot moves independently on a given surface, removing debris from it. Having met an obstacle on the way, the robot decides on a way to overcome it based on special algorithms. After cleaning, most robots return to the charger on their own.

Description

Since the early 2000s, many companies began to produce "robotic vacuum cleaners" such as Electrolux Trilobite, Roomba, Robomaxx, Samsung Navibot, FloorBot, etc. The device is most often a disc with a diameter of 28-35 cm and a height of 9-13 cm. in total, a large contact sensor is installed at the front of the device, with an infrared sensor centered at the top front. Depending on the model, they can be supplied with infrared sensors - "Virtual Wall".

The first and second generation of models needed to manually indicate the size of the room by area, for this, three buttons on the case were used: (small, medium, and large), but this was no longer necessary with the release of the third generation of devices.

To operate, the robot vacuum cleaner uses internal batteries and needs regular recharging from a special module. Newer models have the ability to search for a charger by communicating with it via an infrared sensor. Charging from the mains takes about 3 hours on average. The charging of the first and second generation devices took about 12 hours.

Robot vacuums tend to be low enough to walk under a bed or other furniture. If the Robot Vacuum Cleaner realizes that it is stuck, it will stop moving and start beeping to help the owner locate it.

Device management

You can control the robot vacuum cleaner using the LCD display and buttons located on the top of the robot. Most often, one of three cleaning programs is chosen: regular, quick and "local" - on an area of ​​up to two square meters (there may be differences depending on the model). Modern robotic vacuum cleaners allow cleaning automatically using a task scheduler. This can be useful for those people who want to schedule cleaning while they are at work.

At the end of cleaning, the owner must empty the dust container of the robot vacuum cleaner.

For some models of robot vacuum cleaners, an infrared remote control is used, which allows you to configure the device remotely, which can be useful for people with disabilities.

Orientation in space

There are four ways to orient yourself in space:

Using rangefinders (ultrasonic), such as the Electrolux Trilobite robot vacuum cleaner.
With the help of contact sensors - the sensor on the bumper allows you to register impacts against walls, furniture.
With the help of a "virtual wall", which allows you to limit the cleaning space, and, as a rule, is implemented using an IR emitter in the "wall" and an IR receiver on the robot.
Infrared sensors on the bottom of the device to prevent the device from falling off stairs, such as Roomba.

Improvements to robot vacuum cleaners

In 2005, the 2nd generation Siemens Sensor Cruiser robot vacuum cleaner was released (weight 2 kg, diameter 28 cm, height 12 cm). Unlike 1st generation robots, this machine does not stop cleaning when its dust container is full.It knows when to stop and, following the path of the infrared beam, locates the base station, docks with it on its own and dumps the collected dust into a large dust collector. At each such "visit" the robot recharges its batteries. And this allows it not to stop working until the base station gives a signal to replace the dust collector, or the last speck of dust disappears from the floor.

After that, other manufacturers began to produce similar models.

Possible accessories

• Special brush for collecting hair - a special brush better suited for collecting hair from pets;
• Remote control - to control the robot vacuum cleaner remotely;
• Scheduler - the ability to program the work of the robot vacuum cleaner on a schedule;
• Charging module with infrared beacon - allows the robot vacuum cleaner to automatically return to the charger;
• Virtual wall - a special sensor used to restrict the cleaning area of ​​the robot vacuum cleaner;
• Beacon - used to separate areas of sequential cleaning of the robot vacuum cleaner;
• Larger power source - rechargeable batteries for the robot vacuum cleaner, allowing the device to work for more than 3 hours.

History

• In 1956, Robert Heinlein's fantasy novel "The Door to Summer" was published, the protagonist of which, according to the plot, is the inventor of robots for house cleaning.
• In 1958, the second book of the Dunno trilogy, written by Nikolai Nosov, "Dunno in the Sunny City", was published. In the fourteenth chapter of the work, the main character was awakened by the Cybernetics device, which was an ordinary robot vacuum cleaner.
• The history of robot vacuum cleaners begins in 1997, when a prototype of a robot vacuum cleaner was shown to viewers on the BBC TV channel, on the creation of which Electrolux was working.
• In 2002, the Roomba robot vacuum cleaner was first introduced by the American company iRobot Corporation, but their mass production began a little later. The iRobot Corporation was founded in the United States in 1990 and initially focused on robotics and serving orders from the United States military and the NASA space program.
• The first serially produced automatic room cleaner was the Electrolux Trilobite robot vacuum cleaner (English) of the Swedish concern Electrolux, the serial production of which was launched in 2002.
• In 2004, Electrolux launched the 2nd generation Trilobite 2.0 robot vacuum cleaner.
• By 2004, in addition to Electrolux and iRobot, robotic vacuum cleaners began to produce such companies as: Karcher (RoboCleaner RC 3000 robot vacuum cleaner), Applica (Zoombot RV500 robot vacuum cleaner),
• Samsung (VC-RP30W robot vacuum), LG (ROBOKING robot vacuum), Siemens (Sensor Cruiser robot vacuum), Sharper Image Design (eVac robot vacuum).
• In 2005, the German concern Bosch-Siemens Hausgerate introduced the 2nd generation Sensor Cruiser vacuum cleaner robot.
• After 2005, robot vacuum cleaners also began to produce: Infinuvo, Dyson, Hitachi, Panasonic, etc.
• By 2010, iRobot had become a leader in the household robot segment, having sold nearly 5 million household robots in the United States and Western Europe by this time.
• The iRobot company officially entered the Russian market in 2009 with models of robotic vacuum cleaners adapted and officially certified for the Russian market.
• In 2011, a new and improved series of iRobot Roomba 700-series robotic vacuum cleaners went on wide sale.
• In April 2011, LG introduced the 5th generation of the Hom-Bot robot vacuum cleaner.

Examples of robotic vacuum cleaners

Robot vacuum cleaners (with battery charging base):

Robot vacuum cleaners (with a base for charging the battery and ensuring the emptying of the dustbin of the robot vacuum cleaner):

Based on materials from Wikipedia