Robot teleoperation support system for collision avoidance between wheelchair front wheels and a step

This paper describes a support system for a robot operator to enable a wheelchair to climb a step. The wheelchair and the robot are connected in climbing the step, and the front wheels of the wheelchair are lifted by the difference of velocities between the two vehicles. However, when a caregiver controls the vehicles through an intranet, the wheelchair front wheels collide with the step when the lifting positions of the wheelchair front wheels are near to the step. Therefore, a support system that is able to switch between teleoperation and autonomous control was investigated, and the wheelchair step climbing process was performed by using autonomous control. A theoretical analysis clarifies the requirement of the lifting position in order to avoid a collision between the wheelchair front wheels and a step. The experimental results show the effectiveness of this system.