Materials Today: Proceedings xxx (xxxx) xxx

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Materials Today: Proceedings

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Design and development of automatic warehouse sorting rover

R.V. Subrahmanyam, M. Kiran Kumar, Suraj Nair, Sagar Warrier, B.N. Prashanth ⇑
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Amrita School of Engineering, Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham, Bengaluru, India

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: These days the importance of automation has been increasing drastically; time consumption is also one
Received 1 October 2019 of the most important factors that affects the productivity. The other factors that should be considered
Accepted 27 September 2020 are less human effort, reduced lead time, elimination of work force from unproductive jobs, clear and
Available online xxxx
hassle-free system. In most of the electronic commerce companies like Flipkart, Amazon, Myntra etc.,
the sorting of different type of products happens based on the customer orders. It becomes a huge prob-
Keywords: lem for selecting an item from a very big warehouse. There are already many such kind of sorting system
Rover
that are present in most of the companies but the main drawback is that, the existing systems are not so
Rack
Sort
efficient and appropriate in the sorting mechanism. Above being the case, the project deals with improv-
Warehouse ing the sorting system in more appropriate and efficient approach. In current scenario, the sorting is done
by a rover and is completely programmed. When the order is placed by the customer, the rover gets the
signal, i.e., location of the object or the rack position, where the product is present in the warehouse. The
rover moves to the required location and gets the entire rack to the labelling counter. In the labelling
counter, the operator picks the required object and leaves the rest, then again, the robot places back
the entire rack to the previous location, as a result, there will be a lot and lots of loss in time and power.
Above being the case, the warehouse sorting is modified in such a way that the above-mentioned prob-
lems will be resolved. The objective is to redesign both the rover and the rack in order to sort the items
with ease and efficient. The rover is completely automated, the user simply need to give the initial loca-
tion and the final destination of the product to sort. Rover is programmed to reach the required location
of the rack. The specified items are placed onto the rover and it will bring the specified object to the label-
ing counter. On the other hand, rack is designed depending upon the dimensions of the object and the
purpose. A mechanism is developed for rack to place a required object onto the rover. This will simplify
the process so that the operator need not have to search the product from the entire rack.
Ó 2021 Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Selection and peer-review under responsibility of the scientific committee of the International Confer-
ence on Advances in Materials and Manufacturing Applications.

1. Introduction
There are various robots all around us, many of them are machi-
nes such as washing machine, rice cooker, robotic arm and many
other. Utilization of these machines / robots in our daily life makes
our work much easier at home or even at office [11]. In these days
many of the companies, factories and industries are shifting
towards the automation, every time robots prove themselves that
they are always greater compatible then humans [14]. A simple
automatic warehouse robot that can sort items from various places
of a large warehouse with some prefixed algorithms and programs
to sort a particular item in a specified area [2].
⇑ Corresponding author.
E-mail address: bn_prashanth@blr.amrita.edu (B.N. Prashanth).
The main use of this robot is to reduce the manual intervention
in the sorting process which can be a time taking and most difficult
process [5]. These robots can be activated with the press of a single
button or can be pre-set to activate at a particular time. There are
many such successful E-commerce companies uses these kinds of
robots such as Amazon, Flipkart, Bang good and many more [8].
In supply chain industry, there are millions of items in and
around the warehouse that needs to be stored and distributed all
around the world [6]. India’s online shopping boom is pushing
ecommerce retailers to go all smart with the help of robots, one
such way in which ecommerce has changed retail in India within
the demand for fast and reliable logistics at scale [1]. Companies
like Amazon, Flipkart and others are distributing thousands of
packages / items through their warehouses every single day, and
achieving this demand is a towering order though automation.

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.matpr.2020.09.688
2214-7853/Ó 2021 Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Selection and peer-review under responsibility of the scientific committee of the International Conference on Advances in Materials and Manufacturing Applications.

Please cite this article as: R.V. Subrahmanyam, M. Kiran Kumar, S. Nair et al., Design and development of automatic warehouse sorting rover, Materials
Today: Proceedings, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.matpr.2020.09.688
R.V. Subrahmanyam, M. Kiran Kumar, S. Nair et al. Materials Today: Proceedings xxx (xxxx) xxx

With an increase in consumer demand, the mission is making all the weight on the robot then electronics components which are
things easier for warehouses and fulfilment centres [13]. Grey to be used on the robot are decided which include the type of
Orange and Indian AI robotics company design manufactures and motor and its specification that are to be used to run the rover,
deploys robotics for automation at warehouse distribution and ful- the sensors to be used, the microcontroller, the motor drivers,
filment centres. They have been building tools that can make ware- the wheels and other electronic components to be used on the
houses much more efficient [3]. There are two kinds of robots robot. After all, parts are procured assembling the components
being used at warehouse; First is the Butler, which is an AI pow- and finally testing and calibrating the device are done.
ered robotics system used to health sprit products from shells in Fig. 1, gives an overview of how the design of Automatic Ware-
the warehouse. Second is the Sorter, which automates the sorting house Sorting Rover is designed and assembled. It starts with
of outgoing packages in a distribution centre [7]. The robot carries deciding on how the sorting of items is done and ends with the
mobile storage units to the pickup stations, the butler usually nav- testing and calibration.
igates the warehouse flow retrieving mobile racks and delivering Fig. 2, depicts the working of Automatic Warehouse Sorting
the racks to pick stations for manual picking of orders from the Rover which starts by uploading the distance and directions to
shelves. The operator can pick out and put the items without hav- rover that needs to be covered, the robots move forward my check-
ing to leave the assigned station [10]. After scanning the barcode of ing for obstacles and avoids them if any.
an item, the instructions will be displayed on the screen guide and Table 1, enlists the different components used in the making of
the operator will be instructed where to put the item within the Automatic Warehouse Sorting Rover which includes the Microcon-
station. Once after placing the item in its designated place, the troller, wheels, sensors and modules.
operator presses the lighted lamp to complete the picking process.
The robot is based on the goods to man process and focusses on
reducing walking and search job done by users [4].
Every product has its own pros and cons. The main problem
Table 1
with these products is that they are costly and not much compat- List of Components used in the Rover.
ible for low scale industries [12]. These robots are very efficient in
Components with Specifications Quantity
sorting an item and reduces the human effort where they have to
walk around the warehouse to pick items and to pack them [9]. DC Geared 12 V 120RPM Motors with Position Encoder 4 Nos.
L293D, L298N 12 V Motor Driver 3 Nos.
Above being the case, to eliminate the work force from jobs like
Omni-directional wheels (Dia. 100 mm) 4 Nos.
these is by automating the system of sorting using algorithms Arduino MEGA Microcontroller 1 No.
and the best in class technologies available for now[15]. The main Aluminium sheet 400 mm
400 mm 1 No.
aim is to build a cost and energy efficient system to sort things as Acrylic Sheet 400 mm
400 m 1 No.
quick as possible. Ultrasonic Sensors 4 Nos.
HC-05 Bluetooth Module 1 No.
NEO–6 m GPS Module 1 No.
2. Design and fabrication QMC5883L Compass 1 No.
5 V Cooling Fan 1 No.
12 V Lead Acid Battery 1 No.
Design of automatic warehouse sorting rover is initiated with
Single Strand Jumper and Normal Wiring 60 Nos.
the design of simple, strong frame for the rover and the material MQ–2 Smoke Detector 1 No.
selection for the chassis which is an essential part as it has to carry

Fig. 1. Design Methodology for the Project.

Fig. 2. Working Methodology for the Prototype.

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R.V. Subrahmanyam, M. Kiran Kumar, S. Nair et al.
A variety of microprocessors and controllers are used in Ardu-
ino board designs. Sets of digital and analogue input/output (I/O)
pins that might also be interfaced to more than a few enlargement
boards or Breadboards (shields) and different circuits are outfitted
with the board. Serial communications interfaces, such as Univer-
sal Serial Bus (USB) are used as board on some models, which are
also used for packaging the loads from non-public computers.
The programs are written using C and C++. An integrated develop-
ment environment (IDE) based on the Processing language is used
as a compiler tool. Computer hardware and software program
company, project, and person community uses Arduino as an
open-source which is used to design and manufacture the single-
board microcontrollers and microcontroller kits for developing dig-
ital units and interactive objects which can sense and manage the
bodily objects in the digital world. A microcontroller board based
Arduino Mega 2560 is totally on the ATmega2560. It has fifty-
four digital input or output pins, sixteen analogue inputs, four
UARTs, a sixteen MHz crystal oscillator, a USB connection, a power
jack, an ICSP header, and a reset button. It consists of the entirely
wishes to help the microcontroller; really connect it to a pc with
a USB cable or strength it with AC-to-DC adapter or battery to
get started.
Omni-directional wheels which are unique in nature and are
capable for the free roll in two instructions (x, y). It can either roll
like a wheel or roll laterally the usage of the wheels along its cir-
cumference. Omni-direction wheels allow a rover to convert from
a non-holonomic to a holonomic rover. A non-holonomic robotic
uses normal wheels which has solely 2 out of 3 controllable dof
which are, shifting forward or backwards and rotation. Not being
able to move sideways makes a rover slower and it will be much
less efficient in attaining it’s given objective. The holonomic
Omni-directional wheels are in a position to overcome the above
problem, as it is a rather handy to cross in any direction even at
some unique speed. Unlike ordinary non-holonomic rover, the
holonomic Omni-directional robot can pass in an arbitrary path
Fig. 3. 2-D Drawing of the Rover.
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constantly barring the course of the wheels. It can go lower back
and forth, sideways and rotates at the same position.
An encoder is an electro-mechanical machine which converts
rotary displacement into digital or pulse signals. A rotating disk,
a light source, and an image detector are the part of the optical
encoder. The disk, which is established on the rotating shaft, has
patterns or which looks similar to hole coded into the disk. The
patterns interrupt the light emitted onto the image detector as
the disk rotates and generates a digital or pulse signal output. A
pulse is generated for each incremental step in its rotation by an
incremental encoder. It can grant high decision at an appropriate
price, although absolute position is not achieved as an output by
the incremental encoder. For example, a tachometer encoder is
referred with a single code track as an incremental encoder which
generates a pulse signal whose frequency indicates the velocity of
displacement. However, the direction is not indicated by the out-
put of single-channel encoder. A two-channel, or quadrature, enco-
der uses two detectors and two code tracks to decide the direction.
To sense the position, most frequent kind of incremental encoder is
used by two output channels (A and B). The two output channels of
the quadrature encoder point out each role and route the rotation
by using two code tracks with sectors positioned 90 degrees out of
phase. For example, if A leads B, the disk will rotate in clockwise
direction and if B leads A, the disk will rotate in counter-
clockwise direction. Therefore, both the variety of pulses and the
relative section of indicators A and B are monitored and one can
track both the role and course of rotation.
Fig. 3, depicts the 2-D drawing of the rover with 4 Omni-
directional wheels which are controlled by Arduino mega-micro
controller geared by means of a DC motor with position encoder
for automatic sorting of the items.
Fig. 4, depicts the 3-D CAD model of the rover designed using
Autodesk inventor software for automatic sorting of the items.
Fig. 5, shows the fabricated rover chassis of automatic ware-
house sorting rover.
R.V. Subrahmanyam, M. Kiran Kumar, S. Nair et al. Materials Today: Proceedings xxx (xxxx) xxx

Fig. 4. CAD Model of the Rover designed using Autodesk Inventor.

Fig. 5. Fabricated Rover Chassis.

Fig. 6, depicts the final fabrication model of automatic ware-
house sorting rover.
3. Construction and working
The Automatic Warehouse Sorting Rover is capable of traveling
to a particular distance that is predefined in code with maximum
accuracy using positional encoder even when the battery is low.
It can sense and detect the obstacles in its path and is also capable
of detecting any short circuits in the system. In case of fire, the
smock detector breaks the circuit and turns on the cooling fan to
prevent any further damage. The location of rover can be tracked
via serial port as it is connected to phone by NODE MCU and
GPS. The automatic charging module ensures that the rover is
changed and ready to use any time.
Fig. 7, illustrates the logic according to which the rover works.
When the destination or goal is defined, algorithm works on find-
ing shortest route and checks for obstacles on its path. Every time
it finds an obstacle it changes the route and alternate route is taken
with the help of GPS and Compass module. Once the destination is
reached the distance to be travelled in algorithm becomes 0 and
course is set back in similar manner.

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R.V. Subrahmanyam, M. Kiran Kumar, S. Nair et al.
Fig. 6. Physical Model of the Rover.
3.1. Calculating the speed of rover
The rover developed facilitates Omni-directional wheel drive
mechanism which in terms does not required any steering mecha-
nism. It is capable to complete a rotation i.e., 360 degrees on its
own z-axis. It works in both manual and automatic modes. The
entire project started after approximating weight of the robot.
 Length of field (Assumption) = 5.2 m (L).
 Breadth of field (Assumption) = 6 m (B).
 Number of drive motors = 4 (2 Drives).
 Radius of drive wheel (R) = 0.05 m.
 RPM of each drive motor (N) = 150 RPM.
 Width of the rover (W) = 0.4 m.
 x = (2*p*N)/60 = 15.7 rad/second.
 Speed (V) = R*x = 0.785 m/s.
 Considering efficiency of power delivered to motor = 80%.
 Speed delivered or Speed of Rover (Vr) = V*0.8 = 0.628 m/s.
 Time taken by the rover to cover the field length once
ðtÞ ¼ L=Vr r = 5.2/0.628 = 8.2 s.
4. Results and discussions
In AMR (Autonomous mobile robots), we have to know how far
Robots have travelled and that is where the encoder plays a major
role. Assuming your robot has wheels counting the number of
times those wheels turn or better fractions of a turn isn’t the easi-
est thing to do in electronics as shown in a rotary encoder. When a
light is focused on a disc with bowls cut into it and we can use a
light detector on the other side to count the number of times.
For example, in the below given figure if we see the light six times
then it makes one revolution. In fact, we probably have an encoder
in our mouse, using a mouse with a scroll wheel that scroll, likely
uses and encoder to determine how far it is moved. The wheel
making a user interface is great.
Fig. 8, shows the illustration of slit count in clockwise and coun-
ter clockwise direction.
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Now if the robot need to be travelled for 1 m with the help of
the encoder it will be easier to fix this with encoders. With the help
of the optical encoders, 540 pulses per revolution. It has mounted
on to the motors shaft, gear motor has a 60 to one gear box in it
which means it takes 60 turns of the motor shaft to turn output
axle one revolution.
As the encoder disc rotates the detector (optical encoder)
detects a logic high when it sees a slit, and logic low when it does
not see the slit. The easiest way to measure revolutions is to count
one type of edge. For example, if sensor detects a falling edge that
is the detectors output goes from high to low. When the sensor
detects six falling edges we will know that the robot has made
one revolution.
 Circumference of a wheel (C) = Pi * 2* R.
 Circumference (C) = 3.14 * 2* 0.05 = 0.314 m.
 Number of rotations required to cover one meter of dis-
tance = 1/0.314 = 3.184  3 rotations.
 Number of pulse required to achieve 1 rotation = 540
(Experimentally).
 Number of pulse required to achieve 3 rotations = 3 *
540 = 1,620 pluses.
Based on the weight, the torque required for the robot to move
was estimated and the market survey was done to get to the final
motor which was DC Geared motor with position encoder had been
used in the rover for drive. The shape, size and structure of the
robot were decided to keep in mind the ease of navigation and pro-
gramming. With the motor in hand the power supply to the robot
is to be selected, keeping in mind the voltage supply and the cur-
rent capacity the market availability was narrowed down and the
Lead Acid Batteries were chosen to reduce the cost of the rover.
The IR Sensors which were in use by most of the existing Cleaning
robots were replaced by the Ultrasonic sensors which were more
accurate.
Node MUC and GPS in collaboration provides the rover location
to the user with the help of a Blynk application. The rover can be
easily identified with the help of GPS module; the user just has
R.V. Subrahmanyam, M. Kiran Kumar, S. Nair et al. Materials Today: Proceedings xxx (xxxx) xxx

Fig. 7. Flow Chart Showing the Movement of Robot.

Fig. 8. Illustration of Slit Count in Clockwise and Counter Clockwise.

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R.V. Subrahmanyam, M. Kiran Kumar, S. Nair et al.
to open the Blynk application to know the coordinates. Rover is
also capable to detect the smock or any short circuit in the system
which will stop all the drive motors and turns the emergency fan.
The rover also supports automatic charging which usually simpli-
fies the human work else in a large warehouse like a company have
hundreds of robots and practically impossible to charge them man-
ually every time they get discharged.
Many challenges had to be addressed during every stage of the
development of the robot. These includes the positioning of com-
ponents, wheel alignment, sensor positioning, positional encoders,
calibrations, motor drive overheating, navigation, compass calibra-
tion and positioning.
5. Conclusion and future scope
There are so many warehouse sorting robots present in the
market but only some of them are affordable and economic to most
of the low scale industry. Navigation performance of the robot,
feedback sensors such as optical encoders are also integrated.
There are very fewer robots that are facilitated with some minimal
finicalities. With this work, we tried to reduce the cost of the robot
and make it more affordable for low scale Industries.
In the project positional encoders are used in order to achieve
good accuracy and save power. By using these encoders, one would
be able to achieve good positional accuracy and also able to deter-
mine in which direction the rover is moving with the help of
quadrature encoding method. To improve safety and reduce num-
ber of uncertainties and outages we have used smoke sensor, ultra-
sonic sensor and automatic battery charging facility. Integration of
both Neo-6 m and NODE MCU we would be able to track the loca-
tion of rover and the user get the live location of the rover through
the Blynk application.
To further enhance the navigation of the robot using much bet-
ter algorithm for high accuracy. GSM module can be added to
receive the updates of the rover to user’s mobile phone. Lithium
polymer batteries can be used to reduce the weight of the rover
which can further lead to the reduction of power consumption.
A web-based application could be developed which could con-
trol the robot using artificial intelligence with the help of machine
learning concepts such as neural networks. Different types of rack
could be designed and engineered for different sizes and load car-
rying capacities. Manhattan and Dijkstra algorithm could be used
for increasing the efficiency of the rover. The sensors which we
used has less sensing ability, so instead of using those sensors
usage of more reliable can give us effective performance. So that
it will detect the obstacle accurately and more precisely in less
time. By using wheel encoders one can input a predefined path,
so that the vehicle can travel to the desired location accurately,
which improves manoeuvrability of vehicle.
Materials Today: Proceedings xxx (xxxx) xxx
Declaration of Competing Interest
The authors declare that they have no known competing finan-
cial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared
to influence the work reported in this paper.
Acknowledgements
The authors express their gratitude towards Management of
Amrita School of Engineering, Bangalore, for their support and
encouragement during this research study.
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