14 June 2005

NaviGATOR was selected last week among 40 semifinalists in the Defense Advanced Research Project Agency, or DARPA, Grand Challenge 2005. The car was built by "Team CIMAR," which consists of more than a dozen UF faculty, students and outside engineering experts from Smiths and several other sponsors.

Dave Miller, Vice President/General Manager of Smiths Aerospace, said the car is an excellent learning opportunity for students.
"We encourage young engineering students to be involved in innovative projects. We are pleased to sponsor the University of Florida's team. This is a perfect example of involvement at the right level to motivate students to pursue engineering degrees", commented Dave Miller.

 Winnowed from an original field of nearly 200 entries nationwide, NaviGATOR is headed to qualifying events at the California Speedway in Fontana in late September and early October. Just 20 teams will emerge from qualifying to compete for a $2 million prize in the main race, set for Oct. 8 at an as-yet-undisclosed location in the Southwest.  If CIMAR wins, the prize will be divided between University of Florida's Center for Intelligent Machines and Robotics, Autonomous Solutions and the Eigenpoint Company.

"We are thrilled to have this opportunity, and we plan to go all the way," said Dave Armstrong, project manager for Team CIMAR, the UF Center for Intelligent Machines and Robotics group that built the car.

The team has been working on NaviGATOR since early last fall. The effort comes on the heels of the first Grand Challenge in March of last year. No one came close to winning that event, which required fully robotic or autonomous, cars to complete a 142-mile course from near Los Angeles to near Las Vegas across the Mojave Desert. The leading team, from Carnegie Mellon University, ran just seven miles of the course. The UF team finished eighth after traveling roughly one mile.

With the benefit of that experience and a completely new car, this year will be different, Armstrong said.
Constructed on a box-like blue tubular steel frame, NaviGATOR looks something like a tricked-out Land Rover. But although the car has many factory-made parts, including a Honda Civic engine, it is completely unlike any manufactured car.

The big difference: computers and sensors that give NaviGATOR the ability to sense and respond to the terrain around it without any human intervention.

The DARPA event will require cars to run a narrow, preplanned course complete with obstacles and potential competition-ending hazards such as ditches, cliffs and boulders. To meet the challenge, NaviGATOR has 10 PC-based computers on board, all housed in an air-conditioned box that rests on air springs designed to isolate it from vibrations.

The computers gather and interpret information from numerous on-board navigation and hazard-avoidance technologies, including Global Position and Inertial Navigation systems, cameras, and ultrasonic and infrared sensors. The information then goes to actuators, or automatic controls, that steer, accelerate and brake the car. A seat and traditional pedals on the car allow a person to drive NaviGATOR. But when the computers take over, the pedals move up and down by themselves like player piano keys.

In a recent demonstration, the car drove itself briskly around a test track near Gainesville, successfully avoiding hay bales and barrels placed in its path. When it approached an obstacle, it slowed as if considering the possibilities, then turned its wheels and proceeded around it.

In its longest run ever, the car on May 20 completed more than 24 laps around a dirt track, successfully avoiding 120 barrels and 24 hay bale obstacles. When done, the NaviGATOR had traveled 12 miles at an average speed of 7.5 mph.

If more than one car completes the competition, the prize will go to the fastest. That points to the main challenge: running the course as quickly as possible.