Autonomous Vehicle and Electro-Hydraulic Control (AVEC) Lab

Ontario Tech University (University of Ontario Institute of Technology), Oshawa, Ontario
What the facility does

Aims to advance research and development of autonomous vehicles and advanced control systems.

Areas of expertise

The Autonomous Vehicle and Electro-Hydraulic Control (AVEC) Laboratory is a state-of-the-art facility dedicated to the research and development of autonomous vehicles and advanced control systems. The lab’s primary research objectives include autonomous mobile machines, and safety control and sensing, and energy saving and reliability.

Indicative of its presence as a research facility, the AVEC lab has undertaken several government and industrial projects in energy-saving for electro-hydraulic (EH) systems and reliability engineering for mechanical systems and components.

The lab analyzes optimal route generation and real-time scheduling for specialty vehicles; sensing, control, and safety technologies for autonomous excavations; and dust filtering algorithms for lidar sensors.

At present, the projects in progress include the development of control and sensing algorithms for autonomous operations of an excavator, predictive safety algorithms for an excavator using the 3D sensory information, environmental monitoring algorithms under harsh conditions, route optimization for snowplowing, sweeping, waste collection, and more.

Research services

The AVEC lab aims to advance research and development of autonomous vehicles and advanced control systems. It conducts experimentation, testing and data analysis to improve energy-saving in electro-hydraulic systems, control, sensing, safety algorithms, and the overall quality of autonomous machines.

Sectors of application
  • Construction (including building, civil engineering, specialty trades)
  • Information and communication technologies and media
  • Transportation

Equipment

Function

Mini digger, model RMD500

Excavation tool.

Velodyne Puck lidar sensor (previously VLP-16)

Detects objects with spatial context, 3D mapping

Intel® RealSense™ Computer Vision

Provides the depth info of the detected object.

ZED1 Stereo Camera

Provide the depth info of the detected object.