It will take up to 3 minutes for the induction charger to connect. The “Wireless Charger” and
“Charging” boxes on the cloud software will then be checked. Hovering the cursor over the charging
box will reveal the charging current. It takes approximately 8 hours to recharge a battery pack from
10% to 90% charge.
When the robot is charging it will “go to sleep”. Many of its components are then switched off to
reduce power consumption and to speed charging. However:
▪ The gas detectors remain on so that they don’t need to “warm up” before commencing the
next mission.
▪ It continues to communicate so that it can quickly be “woken up”.
The docking station should be powered up at all times since charging may be disrupted if it’s
switched on when the robot’s already docked. Also, it’s best not to switch off the robot (using the
black On/Off switch) when the robot is in the docking station since this too can disrupt charging. If
this happens pull the robot 30cm back and switch it off and on again.
When a driver checks the “Wake Up” box the robot video streams will typically appear within 1
minute. The robot is then ready to use.
A power socket module (when fitted) enables the robot to be charged within 4 hours. This requires
the robot to be manually plugged into a power supply using a quick-charger that’s supplied with the
socket. The quick-charger’s lead is typically 3 meters long.
Never use the quick charger if the robot’s batteries are fully depleted because this can seriously
damage the robot’s electronics. If the robot is docked, you should first switch off power to the
induction charger before connecting the quick charger.
When inserting the quick-charge plug, rotate the body clockwise before tightening the ring around
its base. You can check the status of the charging using the LEDs and instructions on the quick
charger. There’s a video with more detail – Reference 1.
5. LiDAR Based Navigation
ExR-2 robots are usually supplied with a LiDAR module. This is at the heart of autonomous
navigation and object avoidance (see Section 7). Object avoidance doesn’t work when the robot is
being remotely-controlled by a driver.
It’s useful to understand how the LiDAR works before performing missions. It scans the
environment around the robot as indicated in the diagram below.
The LiDAR is tilted down towards the front of the robot so that it can detect the ground close to the
robot in its usual direction of travel.
The tilted LiDAR also means that it can see higher objects behind the robot so it can build a 3D
model of the surroundings with more relief than a horizontally mounted LiDAR. The robot builds
this model as it performs its first remote controlled mission. The robot then uses this model to
navigate during subsequent autonomous missions.
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