Embedding heuristic rules in RRT path planning of excavators

Abstract

Improving safety and productivity of earthwork operations is of paramount importance, especially in congested sites where collisions are more probable. Automated Machine Guidance and Control technology is expected to improve both safety and productivity of earthwork operations by providing excavator operators with higher level of support regarding the path planning of excavators based on site conditions. However, in spite of the large number of studies related to automated path planning of excavators using well established algorithms from robotics, such as Rapidly-exploring Random Tree (RRT) and Probabilistic Roadmaps (PRM). These studies do not fully consider the engineering constrains of the equipment and do not result in smooth and optimal paths that can be applied in practice. This paper aims to develop a new non-uniform RRT algorithm for the path planning of excavators by embedding heuristic rules and engineering constraints specific to excavators. The proposed method is implemented and tested in Unity 3D game engine environment for visualization and validation purposes. The initial comparative results with the basic RRT algorithm show that the proposed algorithm is able to find a high quality path in a shorter time.