AGV technology has been applied to the production of material handling equipment such as the warp beam transporting trolleys that are used in the textile industry and have played an essential role in transporting heavy equipment for over 50 years. The first AGV was born in 1953, it was converted from a towed tractor with a cradle design and transported goods along wires arranged in the air in a grocery warehouse. By the late 1950s and early 1960s, a variety of trailed AGVs have been applied in different factories and warehouses.
In the 1970s, generally, all the guidance technologies are developed on the basis of the induction of electromagnetic frequencies generated by wires buried in the ground. Then pass through a device called a "ground controller" turns the frequency in the wire on or off, directing the AGV to drive along the predetermined route.
In the late 1980s, wireless navigation technology was introduced into the AGV system. Navigating by the laser and inertial guidance to improve the flexibility and accuracy of the AGV system and avoid interrupting the production line or altering the ground if needed to change the route of AGV. The introduction of these navigation methods makes the guiding methods more diverse.
Since the 1980s, the automatic guided vehicle (AGV) system has developed into one of the largest professional branches in the production and logistics system and has developed a development trend of industrialization, becoming an indispensable part of automation material handling equipment in modern enterprises. AGV develop at the most high speed and is applied in the widest range of production industry in developed countries such as Europe and the United States, especially in Japan, the product specifications, varieties, technical level, equipment quantity, and degree of automation of AGV has already reached the level of standardization, serialization, and assembly line production. With the rapid development of the China logistics system, the applications of AGV are also expanding their range and scale.
How to develop AGV system technology that can meet various needs of customers in all aspects (function, price, quality) is a real problem that we must face in the future.
If one comprehensively analyzes the development of AGV technology, it is not difficult to understand that there are 2 development modes of AGV around the world.
1. Fully Automatic AGV Technology
The fully automatic AGV technology is represented by European and American countries. This type of technology pursues the automation of AGV without requiring manual intervention and has complicated path setting and changeable production processes, which is able to be used in almost all material handling occasions.
These AGVs have perfect functions and advanced technology. And in order to adopt modular design, reduce design costs and improve the standard of mass production, this type of AGV in Europe and the United States has abandoned the pursuit of appearance and adopted the form of assembly of large parts for production and has a wide coverage of series products: various drive modes and navigation selections, and diverse transfer mechanisms are available. The load capacity of the series products can range from 50kg to 60 tons. However, the sales price of such AGVs is still high due to technical and functional limitations. There are a few domestic enterprises that can produce this kind of AGV, with a standard technical level in production, which is comparable to the international level.
2. Compact Design AGV Technology (Automated Guided Cart)
This type of AGV can be represented by Japan - or it can only be called AGC, referring to the name automated guided cart.
Compared with the fully automatic AGV, the compact-designed AGV pursues simplicity and practicality, striving to make users recover the investment cost in the shortest possible time. This type of AGV is widely used in Japanese companies. In terms of quantity, most AGVs produced in Japan belong to this type of product (AGC).
It is a completely compact design for applying simple production that has a single path and fixed process and is only used for handling without emphasizing the functions of automatic loading and unloading. In terms of guidance, most of them only use simple tape guidance methods. Due to the developed basic industry in Japan, AGC manufacturers can configure functional devices that are as simple as they can be, which greatly reduces the manufacturing cost. This kind of AGC has been widely used in Japan in the 1980s and reached the peak of application from 2002 to 2003.