Dianyingpu underwater distance measurement sensor gives pool cleaning robots intelligent perception

Ultrasonic underwater ranging and obstacle avoidance

With the development of service technology, robots for underwater cleaning of swimming pools are widely popular in the market. To realize automatic underwater planning of swimming pool cleaning routes, cost-effective and application-adaptive ultrasonic underwater ranging and obstacle avoidance sensors are indispensable.

Broad market

To this day, North America remains the market with the largest market share in the global swimming pool market (chnavio market report, 2019-2024). At present, the United States has more than 10.7 million swimming pools, and the number of newly added swimming pools, mainly private swimming pools, has been rising year by year. The increase in 2021 reached 117,000, with an average of 1 swimming pool for every 31 people. In France, the world's second largest swimming pool market, the number of private swimming pools exceeded 3.2 million in 2022, with an increase of 244,000 swimming pools in just one year, with an average of 1 swimming pool for every 21 people.

In the Chinese market, which is dominated by public swimming pools, an average of about 43,000 people share one swimming pool (there are 32,500 swimming pools in the country, based on a population of 1.4 billion).

Spain is the fourth country in the world and the second in Europe in terms of the number of swimming pools, with 1.3 million swimming pools (residential, public and collective).

From the comparison between the global and Chinese swimming pool robot markets, the Chinese market size is less than 1% of the global market, and the main markets are still European and American countries. Data shows that the global swimming pool robot market size in 2021 is nearly 11.2 billion yuan, with sales exceeding 1.6 million units. In the US online channel alone, the shipment volume of swimming pool cleaning robots in 2021 reached more than 500,000 units, with a growth rate of more than 130%, which is in the early stage of rapid growth.

At present, the pool cleaning market is still dominated by manual cleaning. In the global pool cleaning market, manual cleaning accounts for about 45%, while pool cleaning robots account for about 19%. In the future, with the increase in labor costs and the popularization of related technologies such as visual perception, ultrasonic perception, path planning, SLAM (simultaneous localization and mapping technology), pool cleaning robots will gradually change from functional to intelligent, and the penetration rate of pool cleaning robots will also increase further.

Dedicated perception,

Underwater distance sensor

Helping pool cleaning robots avoid obstacles intelligently

The ultrasonic underwater ranging obstacle avoidance sensor is a sensor used for underwater obstacle avoidance of robots. The sensor uses ultrasonic underwater ranging technology to measure the distance between the sensor and the object being measured. When the sensor finds an obstacle, the distance of the obstacle is transmitted back to the robot. The robot can perform a series of operations such as stopping, turning, slowing down, patrolling the wall, climbing the wall, etc. according to the direction of the sensor installation and the returned distance value to achieve the purpose of automatically cleaning the swimming pool and avoiding obstacles.

TA is here

Dianyingpu L08 underwater distance sensor

Dianyingpu Sensor has made forward-looking layout and independently developed underwater ranging sensors. By equipping underwater robots with underwater ranging sensors, swimming pool cleaning robots have obstacle avoidance and path planning functions. The L08-module is an ultrasonic underwater obstacle avoidance sensor designed for underwater applications. It has the advantages of small size, small blind area, and good waterproof performance. It supports the modbus protocol and has different ranges, angles, and blind area specifications for users with different needs to choose from.

Basic parameters :

Targeting pain points and breaking through with innovation

How to better empower pool cleaning robots through underwater ranging sensors and achieve feasible technological breakthroughs, services and solutions full-chain integration has always been the focus of Dianyingpu's continuous efforts in R&D. After in-depth research, Dianyingpu targeted the market pain points and made innovative breakthroughs.

1. The cost of similar products on the market is high, and there is no way to popularize them in consumer products: The prices of underwater distance detection sensors sold at home and abroad range from thousands of yuan. Consumer robots are very sensitive to costs, so they cannot be popularized at present.

The company combines the cost target requirements of underwater consumer robots, independently develops transducer matching parameters, localizes core materials, and has experience in mass production. The cost has been reduced to less than 10% of the industry , creating a new era for the popularization of underwater sensors in consumer products.

2. The compatibility of sensor parameters on the market with application scenarios is poor: there are no compatible parameters on the market that can achieve a long distance, a small blind spot, and a large angle for a sensor. It is often necessary to use multiple sensors in combination, and the combination cost is also high.

We have developed a dual-frequency multi-beam transducer that solves the problem of high-quality parameters such as distance, blind spot, and angle: (1) The multi-beam angle is close to 90°, while the measurement range can be more than 6m and the blind spot can be within 5cm, making it highly compatible with application scenarios.

3 Similar sensors on the market are unstable in complex underwater environments: When there is turbid water, strong currents, or silt and aquatic plants underwater, the sensor data is basically invalid, resulting in the robot being unable to make intelligent judgments on operations.

The clever combination of dual-frequency multi-beam and adaptive algorithm, plus Kalman filter processing, solves the problem of use in complex underwater environments. The advantages of different frequencies are superimposed, multi-beam intelligent drive, and diversified working modes. Power, angle, and quality can adapt to scene changes.

4 Product structure and process:

(1) The structure is simple and small in size. When installing, you only need to put it into the shell with the recommended opening and tighten the nut. After the device is connected and the data is output normally, the installation is complete. For later maintenance, you only need to unscrew the nut to remove the sensor. The operation is simple and the learning cost of installation and maintenance is reduced.

(2) Product technology: The transducer uses non-contact distance measurement technology, a closed integrated structure, a dustproof and waterproof design for the entire machine, and the internal circuit is fully wrapped with epoxy resin for protection, and the waterproof effect can reach IP68 level .

Independent research and development, reliability first

During the sensor development process, the R&D team repeatedly optimized and iterated multi-dimensional parameters such as data stability, water flow impact, frequency, and manufacturability, and conducted multi-dimensional tests closely combined with the actual working conditions of the pool cleaning robot to further improve the sensor's environmental and working condition adaptability. At the same time, Dianyingpu has always maintained awe for technology. As a measuring component, underwater ranging sensors are more important than design and debugging. Production and calibration are more important. A complete set of underwater ranging sensor testing and calibration systems have been developed simultaneously . Based on the testing and calibration system, the sensor has undergone reliability tests such as high-temperature and high-humidity storage, hot and cold shock tests, salt spray tests, UV accelerated aging tests, naked drop tests, potion immersion tests (underwater corrosion tests), and vacuum pressure waterproof tests. The above rigorous tests are carried out for each prototype iteration.

After the sensor is integrated with the robot body, the whole machine performance is tested for thousands of hours in combination with the actual working environment of the robot. The mass production yield of this sensor is greater than 99% , and it has been verified by mass market practice.

L08 will continue to update with new features

Looking back at the development path of underwater ranging sensors: research, integration, innovation, verification, each node is the brave innovation, hard exploration, and rich accumulation of Dianyingpu in the field of technology. L08 is the first product of Dianyingpu's underwater ultrasonic ranging application. Dianyingpu will launch more products based on underwater robot underwater obstacle avoidance and depth exploration.

In the future, with the promotion of underwater robots, underwater ranging sensors, as the key support for underwater robot intelligent sensing, will surely bring earth-shaking changes to the underwater robot industry and field.

Review editor: Liu Qing