The optical spatial sensors mounted on MyzharBot v3 and MyzharBot v4 have a intrinsic limitation that make it unable to perceive obstacle that are too near along its forward motion direction. Asus Xtion Pro Live does not see obstacles nearest than 50cm, Stereolabs ZED does not see obstacles nearest than 1 meter.
This limitation is not important in a static environment, but is really dangerous in a really dynamic workplace where objects (other robots, humans, CHILDRENS, …) can suddenly appear in front of the robot in its blind zone.
Furthermore optical 3D sensors cannot see transparent obstacles like glass.
To overcome this limitation on MyzharBot v4 will be equipped with four Ultrasonic range sensors, that despite their low precision (related to optical sensors), they will allow the robot to move with high security in a highly dynamic environments. Even more, ultrasound technology is based on sound reflection, so it will allow the robot to sense also the obstacles invisible to the optical sensors.
The ultrasonic board is controlled by the ST Nucleo32 board powered by a STm32F303 microcontroller and it will be naturally fully compatible with the ROS framework.
Sonar Board prototype
More information will be available on the official page of the Ultrasonic board.
The work in progress on the firmware are available on Github:
