Thermal Modeling for Temperature Aware Operations in Field Robots

Many small size field robots experience heat dissipation problems due to their compact construction, the sealing of compartments to protect against dirt and moisture, and the lack of space and/or power to support an active cooling system. Overheating may cause early failure of their components or even necessitate a shutdown of the robot mid-mission. In this paper we introduce the concept of temperature aware operations in which a robotic system uses thermal models to predict, and thus avoid, overheating events (by either warning the operator or adjusting its behavior autonomously). In this work we develop a model of a small robot’s thermal dynamics based on gray box system identification techniques. We show that this model can predict system temperatures over a 20 minute horizon with a typical accuracy of a few degrees Celsius, thus demonstrating the feasibility of temperature aware operations.