机器人已可替代人类做危险试驾测试

汽车公司也跨足机器人技术领域－－他们透过磨练其机器人技能，以提高生产线效率。 日本本田汽车公司(Honda)甚至更进一步开发出一款可爱的人形机器人 Asimo 。但 Asimo 机器人对于制造产线的帮助不大。其目的只在于吸引群众以及展现日本汽车公司在酷炫机器人技术方面的专长。 如今，机器人正准备大显身手，在汽车公司中担任试驾车手。 福特汽车公司(Ford)最近宣布，该公司的工程师已经发展出首项机器人驾驶测试计划，“目前正用于福特在密西根州的试验场，以满足福特商用车对于更艰巨的 Built Ford Tough 耐力测试要求，”福特汽车表示。 从理论上来看，以机器人驾车进行极度测试的想法并不令人意外。毕竟，谁愿意冒着个人生命危险来进行汽车撞击等试驾测试呢？ 福特强调，其机器人计划的目标“并不在于开发一款能在市区道路上自动驾驶的完全自主汽车，而是要打造一款测试追踪解决方案，让这一类的极度测试能使福特的汽车突破最极端的工程技术限制，同时确保各项安全性。”

你注意到了吗？福特测试车内并没有试驾车手，它完全透过机器人技术进行各种加速、高速冲撞、道路与越野等项目的耐久性测试。
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那么，内部有哪些行动组件呢？其中包括了机器人控制模块、摄影机、GPS追踪机制，以及板上传感器。 安装在测试车中的机器人控制模块可控制车辆的转向、加速与煞车。福特解释说，它被设定为按照预先设定的测试项目，而汽车的位置可由位于中央控制室的摄影机以及精确的GPS装置加以追踪。 如果车辆偏离其预先设定的路程，工程师可使车辆暂停下来，校正测试程序后再重新激活测试。当有行人或其它车辆接近至前方道路路径时，板上传感器也会下令暂停动作。 由 于机器人驾驶的车辆能反复地在崎岖路面上进行测试，福特声称这项测试“透过一连串破损的水泥、鹅卵石、金属栅、粗砂石与泥泞的路面以及超速的颠簸路况，能在短短几百码的距离内压缩实现正常汽车行驶要花十年才能达到的磨损状况。”透过利用机器人驾驶测试技术，工程师可进行无限次的重复测试，从而加速测试过程，从而让福特开发出更具挑战性的耐久性测试，打造出更强悍耐久的汽车产品。 在开发这项计划时，福特的工程师还与犹他州Autonomous Solutions Inc.公司(ASI)合作，共同设计软件与组件，以实现自动化的机器人驾驶汽车测试。ASI是无人驾驶汽车系统、组件与服务供货商，瞄准军事、农业、产业/采矿与汽车应用领域。 根据福特汽车公司表示，这项测试计划已经用于福特2014年推出的全新商用车进行耐久性测试。 本文授权编译自EE Times，版权所有，谢绝转载 编译：Susan Hong 参考英文原文：For Durability Testing, Ford Turns to Robots，by Junko Yoshida

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{pagination} For Durability Testing, Ford Turns to Robots Junko Yoshida MADISON, Wis. — Automotive companies are known as pioneers in robotic technologies. They've honed their robotic skills to improve their production lines. Japan's Honda has gone even further by creating a cute, Asimo humanoid robot. But Asimo isn't a little helping hand on a manufacturing line. Its purpose is to appeal to the masses and show off the Japanese auto company's cool robotic expertise. (Asimo even has its own website.) Now, robots are going to work as test drivers for auto companies. Ford recently announced that its engineers have developed "the industry's first robotic test driving program." It is now in use at Ford's Michigan Proving Grounds in Romeo, Mich., "in order to meet demands that Ford trucks undergo ever more strenuous Built Ford Tough testing with greater frequency," said the auto company. Logically. There's no surprise at the idea of robotically driven vehicles for intense testing purposes. After all, who wants to sacrifice a human test driver's life and limb in the name of building a "tough" car? Ford emphasized that its robotic program's goal is: Not to develop a truly autonomous vehicle that can drive itself on city streets... [but] to create a test track solution that allows for this type of intense testing that could take our vehicles to the most extreme limits of their engineering while ensuring the safety of all involved. You'll find no test drivers inside Ford’s testing vehicles. Its robotic technology is at work, operating the auto company’s new accelerated, high-impact, on-road and off-road durability testing. So, what are the moving parts here? They include a robotic-control module, cameras, a GPS tracking mechanism, and on-board sensors. The robotic control module installed in the test vehicle controls vehicle steering, acceleration, and braking. It is set to follow a preprogrammed course, and the vehicle's position is tracked via cameras in a central control room and a GPS unit accurate to plus/minus one inch, Ford explained. If the vehicle strays from its programmed course, engineers can stop the vehicle, course-correct, and restart the test. Onboard sensors can command a full stop if a pedestrian or another vehicle strays into the path, according to Ford. With robotically driven vehicles repeatedly performing tests on torturous surfaces, Ford claims that the tests "can compress 10 years of daily driving abuse into courses just a few hundred yards long, with surfaces that include broken concrete, cobblestones, metal grates, rough gravel, mud pits and oversized speed bumps." In developing this program, Ford engineers collaborated with Utah-based Autonomous Solutions Inc. (ASI) to design the software and components that enable autonomous, robotic operation of the test vehicle. ASI, an expert in unmanned ground vehicle systems and components, serves clients in military, agriculture, industrial/mining, and automotive. The pilot program, according to Ford, has been used most recently for durability testing of Ford's all-new full-size Transit van, which launches in 2014.