Navigation and control of a trolley by using a dynamical model

Abstract

This work deals with the guidance and control of the motion of a trolley. The trolley is composed from two rear wheels, each of them controlled separately, and from two front castor wheels (see Figure 1). Given N points P i , i = 1, …, N in the horizontal plane, a finite time interval [0, t f ], and a sequence of times τ 1 = 0 < τ 2 < ⋯ < τ N = t ƒ . Based on a dynamical model of the trolley, and by using the concept of path controllability, a control law for the trolley's rear wheels is derived, to steer the trolley's center ( x, y) in such a manner that ( x, y) will pass through P i at the time τ i , i = 1, …, N, respectively.