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Accelerating AMR Development – Precisol’s CAN Datalogger for Autonomous Mobile Robot Testing
The Challenge: Debugging the Brain of an Autonomous Mobile Robot
Our customer, an innovative startup specializing in Autonomous Mobile Robots (AMRs) for warehouse logistics, faced a critical challenge in their development cycle. Their flagship AMR, relies heavily on a complex network of internal sensors, actuators, and control modules that communicate primarily via the CAN (Controller Area Network) bus. During the rigorous testing phase, their development team frequently encountered intermittent issues, unexpected behaviours, and performance discrepancies. Diagnosing these problems was incredibly difficult because they lacked a comprehensive, real-time record of the internal CAN bus traffic.
Traditional debugging methods involved:
- Limited On-Board Logging: Basic logging on the AMR provided only high-level events, lacking the granular CAN message data needed for deep analysis.
- Manual Probing: Connecting oscilloscopes or basic CAN sniffers required the robot to be stationary and provided only short bursts of data, making it impossible to capture sporadic issues during dynamic operations.
- Time-Consuming Iterations: Identifying the root cause of a bug often involved multiple test runs, code modifications, and lengthy data extraction processes, significantly slowing down the development timeline and increasing costs.
Customer recognized that without a robust solution for CAN bus data logging and remote AMR diagnostics, their development cycle would remain inefficient, delaying market entry and hindering their ability to refine the autonomous capabilities.
The Solution: Precisol’s CAN Datalogger for Comprehensive Data Capture
To overcome these debugging bottlenecks and accelerate their AMR development, customer integrated the Precisols CAN Datalogger into their testing methodology. This industrial-grade, standalone datalogger was chosen for its ability to non-intrusively capture high-fidelity CAN bus traffic over extended periods, even during complex, dynamic robot operations.
The implementation was straightforward:
- Non-Intrusive Connection: The Precisols CAN Datalogger was simply connected to the internal CAN bus, acting as a passive listener without interfering with the robot’s real-time operations.
- Configurable Logging: Developers configured the datalogger to capture all relevant CAN messages, including sensor readings (LIDAR, encoders), motor commands, navigation data, and system status updates, with precise timestamps.
- Autonomous Operation: The datalogger operated independently, continuously recording data to its internal storage during test runs, whether the robot was navigating a warehouse, performing pick-and-place tasks, or encountering unexpected obstacles.
- Easy Data Retrieval: After each test session, the development team could easily retrieve the logged data from the Precisol’s datalogger via a USB connection or, for more advanced setups, wirelessly.
- Offline Analysis: The captured CAN data was then imported into a customized analysis software, allowing developers to replay the bus traffic, visualize message sequences, and correlate events with observed robot behaviour.
This seamless integration provided customer with an unprecedented level of insight into the internal workings of their AMR.
Results: Accelerated Debugging and Enhanced AMR Performance
The deployment of the Precisols CAN Datalogger delivered immediate and transformative benefits for customer:
- Rapid Root Cause Analysis: Developers could now precisely pinpoint the exact sequence of CAN messages that led to an intermittent bug or unexpected behaviours. This drastically reduced the time spent on troubleshooting, allowing them to identify and fix issues much faster.
- Comprehensive Test Coverage: The ability to log continuous CAN data during long, complex test runs meant that even rare or sporadic issues could be captured and analyzed, leading to more thorough testing.
- Improved Algorithm Refinement: With detailed insights into how control commands were executed and sensor data was processed on the CAN bus, engineers could fine-tune navigation algorithms, motor control loops, and obstacle avoidance routines with greater precision.
- Reduced Development Cycles: By accelerating debugging and validation, the Precisols CAN Datalogger significantly shortened the overall development timeline for the AMR, bringing it closer to market readiness.
- Enhanced Reliability and Safety: A deeper understanding of the AMR’s internal communication helped identify potential failure points and improve the robustness of the robot’s control systems, contributing to a safer and more reliable product.
- Cost Efficiency: Less time spent on manual debugging and fewer repeated test runs translated directly into reduced development costs.
Precisol’s CAN Datalogger proved to be an indispensable tool for our customer. By providing comprehensive, non-intrusive CAN bus data logging for AMRs, it empowered their development team with the granular insights needed to accelerate debugging, refine control algorithms, and ultimately deliver a more reliable and performant autonomous mobile robot, solidifying their position in robotics development tools.
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Arima Leonardo
Electrician
Alex Piter
Designer
Mariya Komola
Developer
David Malan
Developer
Arima Leonardo
Electrician
Alex Piter
Designer
Mariya Komola
Developer
David Malan
Developer
