SVMs for Vibration-Based Terrain Classification

When an outdoor mobile robot traverses different types of ground surfaces, different types of vibrations are induced in the body of the robot. These vibrations can be used to learn a discrimination between different surfaces and to classify the current terrain. Recently, we presented a method that uses Support Vector Machines for classification, and we showed results on data collected with a hand-pulled cart. In this paper, we show that our approach also works well on an outdoor robot. Furthermore, we more closely investigate in which direction the vibration should be measured. Finally, we present a simple but effective method to improve the classification by combining measurements taken in multiple directions.

• Type: Conference
• Year: 2007
• Where: AMS
• Authors: Christian Weiss, Matthias Stark, Andreas Zell
• Keywords: AMS 2007, Ground Surfaces, Outdoor Mobile Robot, Robotics, Vibration