DESIGNING FUZZY LOGIC NAVIGATION SYSTEM

FOR AUTONOMOUS GROUND VEHICLE (AGV)

Captain Zin Maung Cho

ABSTRACT
The navigation or motion planning is a highly complex task and a key aspect when designing an autonomous
ground vehicle. This paper deals with the motion planning of an autonomous ground vehicle to reach the goal
safely in environment with obstacles. This paper proposes a fuzzy logic navigation technique. In this technique,
a collision-free path for moving the vehicle among obstacles is based on three fuzzy logic controls: Target
Tracking Fuzzy Logic Control (TTFLC) and two types of Obstacle Avoiding Fuzzy Logic Controls (OAFLC).
These three controls are combined to move the vehicle to the goal along a collision-free and shortest path. We
will construct and analyze proposed method using FUZZY LOGIC toolbox and SIMULINK toolbox on
MATLAB.
Keywords: Navigation, Autonomous Ground Vehicle, Fuzzy Logic Control, Target Tracking Fuzzy Logic
Control, Obstacle Avoiding Fuzzy Logic Control.

………………………………………………………………………………………………
1. INTRODUCTION
Nowadays autonomous ground vehicles
are used in different areas such as
automation of different industrial sectors,
replacement of human works and military
operation. Navigation associated to mobile
robot is the problem of finding a feasible
path form one configuration to another by
avoiding the obstacles along its path.
Although many researchers have developed
many navigation techniques, there is still no
complete navigation technique or
combination of techniques.
Many researchers have used fuzzy logic
techniques in the navigation system of AGV.
Most of researchers considered distance
detection to the obstacles. For example, a
navigation system using fuzzy logic has been
presented by Faisal et al. [2]. The authors
proposed how to use FLCs for the target
tracking and obstacles avoiding control of
WMR. But the authors only use the input for
distance detection to the obstacles, and hence
the path to the target will be longer than the
path by edges detection to obstacles.
Edge detection technique can get shorter
path than distance detection technique. But
edge detection should not be used only one
because detecting edges takes more time
than detecting distance. These detection
techniques should be use alternately
according to obstacles conditions. In this
paper these detection techniques are
designed and combined optimally.
2. The Kinematic Model of an
Autonomous Ground Vehicle
The schematic diagram of a two-
dimensional plane for an autonomous ground
vehicle is shown in Figure 1. The wheels
have the same radius, r. The driving wheels
are separated by a distance L. In general, the
posture of the vehicle in the two dimensional
plane at any instant is defined by the systems
Cartesian coordinates and heading angle, 𝜃,
with respect to a global frame reference, Pc =
(xc, yc, 𝜃) [1].
In this paper, the radius of wheel (r) is
0.11 m, and the distance between driving
wheels (L) is 0.29 m.
 3.1. Target Tracking Fuzzy Logic Control
(TTFLC)
If the environment is without obstacles
the adopted fuzzy logic controller has a main
function is to reach the target position. In this
case the controller has two inputs which are
the distance between the robot and the goal
and the angle between robot orientation and
Figure 1. The Schematic Diagram of the target orientation. The linguistic variables
Autonomous Ground Vehicle used for inputs and outputs are illustrated in
Figures 2, Figures 3 and Figures 4.
Kinematics modeling describes the
trajectories that the mobile robots follow
when subject to commanding angular
velocity. The kinematic model of robot
driven by skid steer motion is described by a
simple non-linear model [3]:
  vr  vl  
v  r .  2   Figure 2. Membership function for distance
   
  vr  vl  
  r.  
  L 
x  v cos  
 
y  v sin   (1)
Where, r = wheel radius (m), L = the
distance between each driving wheel and the Figure 3. Membership function for error
vehicle axis of symmetry in y-direction (m), angle
θ = moving vehicle orientation (degree), v=
velocity of the moving vehicle (m/s), vr =
angular velocity of right wheel (rad/s), and vl
= angular velocity of left wheel (rad/s).

3. Fuzzy Logic Controllers

There are three fuzzy logic controllers
which have been designed to accomplish the
navigation task; firstly, Target Tracking
Fuzzy Logic Control (TTFLC) for achieving
the target reaching task, secondly, the other
two Obstacle Avoidance Fuzzy Logic
Controls (OAFLC) for performing the
obstacle avoidance mission.
Figure 4. Output membership functions for
velocity of left and right wheel
The angular velocity of left and right
wheels is determined via fuzzy rules. They
are shown in Table 1 for left and right
wheels, respectively.
Table 1. Rules table for the left and right used for inputs and outputs are illustrated in
velocity Figures 5, Figures 6 and Figures 7.
No Distanc Err_Angl
LV RV
. e e
1 Z N B3 F3
2 Z SN B2 F2
3 Z NNZ B1 F1
4 Z Z Z Z
5 Z NPZ F1 B1
6 Z SP F2 B2
7 Z P F3 B3 Figure 5. Input membership function for the
8 N N Z F6 left, front and right distances
9 N SN F1 F5
10 N NNZ F2 F4
11 N Z F3 F3
12 N NPZ F4 F2
13 N SP F5 F1
14 N P F6 Z
15 M N Z F6
16 M SN F1 F5
17 M NNZ F2 F4 Figure 6. Input membership function for
18 M Z F3 F3 error angle
19 M NPZ F4 F2
20 M SP F5 F1
21 M P F6 Z
22 F N F1 F7
23 F SN F2 F6
24 F NNZ F3 F5
25 F Z F4 F4
26 F NPZ F5 F3 Figure 7. Output membership functions for
27 F SP F6 F2 velocity of left and right wheel
28 F P F7 F1
29 VF N F2 F8 The angular velocity of left and right
30 VF SN F3 F7 wheels is determined via fuzzy rules. They
31 VF NNZ F4 F6 are shown in Table 2 for left and right
32 VF Z F5 F5 wheels, respectively. A rule base is obtained
33 VF NPZ F6 F4 by a set of IF-THEN rules and inference
34 VF SP F7 F3 evaluates the rules and combines the results
35 VF P F8 F2 of the rules using Mamdani method.
When an obstacle detected, the suitable
3.2 OAFLC (Distance Detection)
fuzzy rule will be activated according the
If the environment is with obstacles the
condition.
inputs for the proposed fuzzy logic system
Table 2. Rules table for the left and right
are the distances measured from the obstacle
velocity
to the sensors and the angle between the
No L F R Err_Angl L RV
robot and the goal. The linguistic variables
 . D D D e V
1 N N N ANY B B
2 N N M ANY F S
3 N N F ANY F S
4 N M N ANY S S
5 N M M ANY F S
6 N M F ANY M M
7 N F N ANY M M Figure 8. Input membership function for the
8 N F M ANY M F
left and right angles
9 N F F ANY M M
10 M N N ANY S F
11 M N M ANY F S
12 M N F ANY S M
13 M M N ANY S F
14 M M M P S F
15 M M M N F S
16 M M F ANY M S
17 M F N ANY F M Figure 9. Output membership functions for
18 M F M ANY F M velocity of left and right wheel
19 M F F P M F The angular velocity of left and right
20 M F F N F M wheels is determined via fuzzy rules. They
21 F N N ANY M S are shown in Table 3 for left and right
22 F N M ANY F S wheels, respectively. A rule base is obtained
23 F N F ANY S F by a set of IF-THEN rules and inference
24 F M N ANY M M
evaluates the rules and combines the results
25 F M M ANY S M
of the rules using Mamdani method.
26 F M F ANY M F
27 F F N ANY M M Table 3. Rules table for the left and right
28 F F M P F M velocity
29 F F M N M F
30 F F F ANY M M No LA RA LV RV
1 S S None None
3.3 OAFLC (Edge Detection) 2 S M S M
The inputs of OAFLC (edge detection) 3 S L S M
are the angles of left and right sides of 4 M S M S
obstacles as well as the angle between the 5 M M F S
robot and the target (error angle). The 6 M L S F
outputs of OAFLC (edge detection) are the 7 L S M S
8 L M F S
velocities of the left and right motors. The
9 L L F S
linguistic variables used for inputs and
outputs are illustrated in Figures 8 and When an obstacle detected, the suitable
Figure 9. fuzzy rule will be activated according the
condition.

4. System Design of Autonomous Ground

Vehicle
 System design of autonomous Ground
Vehicle can be seen in Figure 10. In this
system, three fuzzy logic controllers are
constructed and used to navigate the AGV
from the initial configuration to the goal.
TTFLC is proposed to move the AGV to
its target smoothly. This controller will work
if there is no obstacle in front of the vehicle.
OAFLC is proposed to generate a control
signal in order to avoid obstacles in
environments with obstacles. OAFLC
includes two difference controllers: OAFLC
(distance detection) and OAFLC (edge
detection).

Figure 10. System Design of Autonomous Ground Vehicle

5. Simulation Results
 To validate the proposed fuzzy logic
controllers, a scenario has been adopted and
carried out in this paper using the
MATLAB-SIMULINK environment. In this
scenario, an artificial workspace has been
created with nine identical static obstacles
that were placed in different positions in the
workspace. An initial position and the target
point of an autonomous ground vehicle can
be set arbitrarily in the workspace.
The workspace dimensions are fixed by
four corner points having coordinates (–1, –
1), (11, –1), (11, 11), (–1, 11) to combine
the workspace grid. The dimensions of the
obstacles described by their peripheral
vertices are given in Table 4. The Cartesian
coordinate of the initial point is Ps (5, 0) and
the target point is Pt (5, 10).
By running the implemented
SIMULINK model, the autonomous ground
vehicle started moving from a start position
towards to the destination position. As can
be observed from the Figure 11, the vehicle
avoided obstacles successfully and safely
using distance detection method and
proposed method. The decision is made to
correctly change the vehicle’s direction
when it approached the obstacles, and
finally, the target is reached.
Table 4. Obstacles description on the
workspace grid
Obstacle Peripheral Vertices
No. Coordinates
1 (1, 2), (3, 2)
2 (5, 2), (7, 2)
3 (0, 4), (2, 4)
4 (4, 4), (6, 4)
5 (8, 4), (10, 4)
6 (2, 6), (4, 6)
7 (7, 6), (9, 6)
8 (1, 8), (3, 8)
9 (5, 8), (7, 8)
The performance of distance detection
method and proposed method can be
observed in Table 5 and Figure 11.
Figure 11. Simulation result of designed fuzzy logic controllers, moving from initial point P s
(5, 0) to target point Pt (5, 10) (a) with distance detection method and (b) with proposed
method

Table 5. Performance Analysis of Proposed Method

Analysis Distance Detection Method Proposed Method

Length of Path (m) 14.5 12.54
Number of Decision Making 65 58

6. Conclusion demonstrated by considering a scenario with

In this paper, three fuzzy logic
controllers have been implemented to
control the angular velocities of the left and
right wheels of an autonomous ground
vehicle. These velocities guide the vehicle
safely to reach the destination in a static
environment without colliding with
obstacles presented on its way. The
validation of the proposed method has been
nine identical static obstacles are placed
within the workspace.
In contrast, the autonomous ground
vehicle was capable of avoiding obstacles
safely and reaching the target with a feasible
path between the initial and the target points
in both methods. Proposed method can
generate shorter path than distance detection
method.

REFERENCES
[1] A. Al-Mayyahi, W. Wang and P. Birch, “Adaptive Neuro-Fuzzy Technique for
Autonomous Ground Vehicle Navigation”, Robotics, ISSN 2218-6581, 2014.
[2] Faisal M, Hedjar R, Al Sulaiman M and Al-Mutib, “Fuzzy Logic Navigation and
Obstacle Avoidance by a Mobile Robot in an Unknown Dynamic Environment”, Int J
Adv Robotic Sy 10: 1-7, 2013.
[3] K. Maatoug, M. Njah and M. Jallouli, “Autonomous Navigation of Unicycle Mobile
Robot Based on Fuzzy Controller”, NNGT Int. J. on Artificial Intelligence, Vol. 2,
Feb 2015.
[4] Li-Xin Wang, “A Course in Fuzzy Systems and Control”, Prentice-Hall International,
Inc., International Edition, 1997.
………………………………………………………………………………………………………………
.
Author:
Captain Zin Maung Cho, a graduate of B.C.Sc, was commissioned from Defence
Services Academy in 2007. He earned his M.Tech at Moscow State University of Railway
Engineering (Russian Federation) in 2012. Now he is serving as an assistant lecture of the
Department of Electronic, Communication and Automation System, DSSTRC.