Controller Development and Implementation for Path Planning and Following in an Autonomous Urban Vehicle

Autonomous Land Vehicles (ALVs), due to their considerable potential applications in areas such as mining and defence, are currently the focus of intense research at robotics institutes worldwide. Control systems that provide reliable navigation, often in complex or previously unknown environments, is a core requirement of any ALV implementation. Three key aspects for the provision of such autonomous systems are: 1) path planning, 2) obstacle avoidance, and 3) path following. The work presented in this thesis, under the general umbrella of the ACFR’s own ALV project, the ‘High Speed Vehicle Project’, addresses these three mobile robot competencies in the context of an ALV based system. As such, it develops both the theoretical concepts and the practical components to realise an initial, fully functional implementation of such a system. This system, which is implemented on the ACFR’s (ute) test vehicle, allows the user to enter a trajectory and follow it, while avoiding any detected obstacles along the path.