Teleoperation of autonomous vehicle

Abstract

Teleoperation is using remote control from outside line of sight.The operator is often assisted by cameras to emulate sitting in the vehicle.In this report a system for teleoperation of an autonomous Volvo FMX truck is specified, designed, implemented and evaluated.First a survey of existing solutions on the market is conducted finding that there are a few autonomous and teleoperation solutions available, but they are still new and information is sparse.To identify what types of requirements are needed for such a system and how to design it a literature study is performed.The system is then designed from the set requirements in a modular fashion using the Robot Operating System as the underlying framework.Four cameras are mounted on the cab and in software the images are stitched together into one 360 image that the operator can pan around in.The system is designed so that the operator at any time can pause the autonomous navigation and manually control the vehicle via teleoperation.When the operators intervention is completed the truck can resume autonomous navigation.A solution for synchronization between manual and autonomous mode is specified.The truck is implemented in a simulation where the functionality and requirements of the system is evaluated by a group of test subjects driving a test track.Results from simulation show that latencies higher than 300 ms lead to difficulties when driving, but having a high frame rate is not as critical.The benefit of a full 360 camera view compared to a number of fixed cameras in strategic places is not obvious.The use of a head mounted display together with the 360 video would be of interest to investigate further.