Autonomous staircase detection and stair climbing for a tracked mobile robot using fuzzy controller

Theoretical analysis and implementation of autonomous staircase detection and stair climbing algorithms on a novel rescue mobile robot are presented in this paper. The main goals are to find the staircase during navigation and to implement a fast, safe and smooth autonomous stair climbing algorithm. Silver is used here as the experimental platform. This tracked mobile robot is a tele-operative rescue mobile robot with great capabilities in climbing obstacles in destructed areas. Its performance has been demonstrated in rescue robot league of international RoboCup competitions. A fuzzy controller is applied to direct the robot during stair climbing. Controller inputs are generated by processing the range data from two LASER range finders which scan the environment one horizontally and the other vertically. The experimental results of stair detection algorithm and stair climbing controller are demonstrated at the end.