Automatic guidance for agricultural vehicles in Europe

Research activities concerning automatic guidance of agricultural vehicles - or implements - have led to various solutions. Sensors, including mechanical ones, global navigation satellite systems (GNSS), machine vision, laser triangulation, ultrasonic and geomagnetic, generate position, attitude and direction-of-movement information to supply control algorithms. Actuators, like hydraulic valves, are used to transform guidance information into changes of position and direction. In the European Union, depending on who is funding the project, the systems range from a PC, with a frame grabber or a GNSS receiver used to guide an implement along a predefined path with speeds up to 3 m/s, to a multiprocessor bifocal road recognition system for autonomous cars driving on motorways with a spaed of 130 km/h. Research projects are performed in universities, governmental institutions and manufacturers' laboratories, as well as in national and international consortia. This chapter provides an overview of guidance systems for agricultural vehicles or implements in Europe, without claims to completeness. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.