French National Competition Prize For BA Systèmes Outdoor Shuttle
27th March 2017
BA Systèmes, the French leader in AGV-based intralogistics systems, won the 2nd French National Outdoor Robotics Competition for its latest automated vehicle, the HLT10, an outdoor shuttle.
Launched by the French Ministry of Economy and Finance (DGE), the competition was staged earlier this month at the Museum of Air and Space, in Paris Le Bourget.
This competition offered a panorama of technologically innovative robotic systems from French companies and laboratories designed to develop a growing industrial sector with strong growth potential. The prizes, awarded by a jury composed of robotics and industry professionals, were based on demanding criteria at the crossroads of many technological challenges, such as the quality of human/ robot interaction, economic impact, labour pain reduction, technological innovation, ease of implementation and, of course, safety.
BA Systèmes’ HLT10 (Heavy Load Truck with a payload of 10 tons), awarded with the video prize (for those who could not move their demonstration), is an automated shuttle-type vehicle dedicated to transporting heavy loads between buildings. Stemmed from the expertise of BA Systèmes in mobile robotics for intralogistics applied to robotics in an outdoor environment, this shuttle of 8.2m by 2.7m concentrates several technological innovations which guarantee:
– Reliable and efficient automated guidance in an outdoor environment thanks to odometry and an inertial unit
– Autonomy in energy thanks to Li-Ion batteries and an automatic opportunity charging
– Optimum safety of the outdoor shuttle’s autonomous operation, thanks to a chain consisting of a PLC, laser safety scanners and signage devices.
The HLT can handle 18 pallets simultaneously. Flexible, the shuttle can be equipped with a refrigerated box equipped with motorized chain or roller conveyors or with a simple platform for manual or automatic loading. Provided with AGV Manager, a fleet management software, designed and developed by BA Systèmes, an HLT10 type of AGV fleet interfaces directly with the customer’s plant management tool.
The HLT10 is now in an industrialization phase and a prototype is already operating in real conditions at a BA Systèmes customer site.