JP7637170B2 - Work vehicles - Google Patents

Description

The present invention relates to a work vehicle equipped with a luggage carrying section provided on the chassis, and a connection and switching section that is connected between the luggage carrying section and a luggage loading/unloading section at the luggage destination or luggage source and is used to switch luggage.

Conventionally, as this type of work vehicle, there is known one that enters an airport and performs baggage replacement work on the body of an airplane (see, for example, Patent Document 1).
The work vehicle in the above-mentioned Patent Document 1 is a high-lift truck for airports, commonly known as a catering truck, and is configured so that a box-shaped baggage carrier can be raised and lowered relative to the chassis by a scissor-link type lifting mechanism. This high-lift truck for airports also includes a platform that is movable relative to the baggage carrier and serves as a connection and exchange unit that connects the aircraft body and the baggage carrier.

Airport high lift trucks transport in-flight meal carts filled with in-flight meals from the in-flight meal factory to aircraft parked at the airport, and travel not only within the airport but also on public roads. Workers park the airport high lift truck in a designated parking position below the aircraft's fuselage entrance and raise the baggage carrier and platform to the height of the aircraft's entrance and then move the platform horizontally to connect it to the entrance. The in-flight meal cart in the baggage carrier is then transported through the platform and entrance to the galley inside the aircraft. In this way, the in-flight meal cart as baggage is swapped between the baggage carrier and the aircraft as the baggage loading/unloading section.

JP 2005-225569 A

In conventional airport high-lift trucks, after stopping the truck, the worker raises and lowers the baggage compartment and moves the platform horizontally to align the platform tip near the bottom edge of the aircraft's entrance, but this alignment operation requires careful operation by the worker. If the platform tip hits the aircraft's entrance door or its surroundings and damages the aircraft, it could have a significant impact on the operation of the aircraft, which was a burden on the worker.
In addition, after a worker first aligns the height position of the baggage carrying section with the height of the aircraft's entrance, if a misalignment occurs between the height position of the baggage carrying section and the height position of the aircraft's entrance due to refueling, etc., the worker must then fine-tune the height position of the baggage carrying section again. The burden on the worker is also increased in that the worker must constantly check whether the misalignment exceeds an acceptable range.
In addition, when the above-mentioned truck parks at a designated position below the aircraft's entrance, the entrance is no longer in the forward field of view of the worker in the driver's seat when the truck gets close enough to the aircraft, making it difficult to determine a suitable stopping position for connecting the baggage loading section to the aircraft entrance, so another worker was needed to guide the truck.

The present invention was made in consideration of the above-mentioned circumstances, and aims to provide a work vehicle that is equipped with a luggage carrying section provided on the chassis, and a connection and switching section that is connected between the luggage carrying section and a luggage loading/unloading section at the luggage destination or luggage source and is used to switch luggage, thereby reducing the burden on the worker and enabling accurate work to be performed.

The present invention provides a means for solving the above-mentioned problems as follows. That is, the first invention is characterized by comprising a luggage carrier provided on a vehicle chassis, a connection switching unit provided on the luggage carrier and connected between the luggage carrier and a luggage loading/unloading unit of a luggage destination or luggage source for switching luggage, an object image acquisition unit provided on the luggage carrier and/or the connection switching unit for acquiring data on surrounding object images, and a control unit for controlling a drive actuator based on the acquisition results of the object image acquisition unit to move the luggage carrier and/or the connection switching unit relative to the vehicle chassis.

According to the first aspect of the present invention, the control unit can recognize the positional relationship between the luggage loading/unloading unit and the luggage vehicle mounting unit and the connection and switching unit on behalf of the worker using the object image acquisition unit. Then, based on the recognized positional relationship, the control unit can move the luggage vehicle mounting unit and the connection and switching unit to appropriate positions relative to the chassis. That is, the movement of the luggage vehicle mounting unit and the connection and switching unit is automatically controlled based on the acquisition result of the surrounding object image data by the object image acquisition unit. Moreover, the movement control is performed without hesitation based on the objective object image data, so that the work can be performed accurately and quickly.
In addition, after the height position of the luggage carrying section has been temporarily adjusted to the height of the aircraft's entrance/exit, if a positional deviation occurs between the height position of the luggage carrying section and the height position of the aircraft's entrance/exit, the control section can recognize the positional deviation using the object image acquisition section and automatically correct the position.
As a result, the operator is no longer required to perform the conventional positioning operation, and the workload is reduced. In the airport high lift truck, the control unit accurately aligns the platform tip near the lower edge of the aircraft's fuselage doorway without the operator having to perform the operation. This reduces the operator's burden and shortens the work time while performing the work accurately when using the airport high lift truck to transport in-flight meal carts and the like.

In the second invention, in the first invention, the luggage carrier is configured to be raised and lowered relative to the chassis by a lifting mechanism, and the control unit is configured to move the luggage carrier in the lifting direction by controlling the drive actuator of the lifting mechanism based on the acquisition result of the object image acquisition unit.

According to the second invention, the baggage carrying unit is automatically controlled to rise and fall and positioned at an accurate height based on the data of surrounding object images acquired by the object image acquisition unit. This makes it possible to automate the operation of raising the baggage carrying unit to the height of the aircraft's entrance after an operator parks the truck at a specified parking position below the aircraft's entrance in an airport high-lift truck. As a result, the operator is no longer required to carefully control the elevation and lowering of the baggage carrying unit as in the past, reducing the burden on the operator.

In a third aspect of the present invention, the hydraulic system according to the second aspect of the present invention further includes a hydraulic pump that drives the drive actuator, a hydraulic control valve that switches the direction of movement of the drive actuator, and a hydraulic oil tank provided between the hydraulic pump and the hydraulic control valve,
The control unit is configured to switch the hydraulic control valve with the hydraulic pump stopped when lowering the luggage carrier based on the results of acquisition by the object image acquisition unit, and to release hydraulic oil from the drive actuator of the lifting mechanism to the hydraulic oil tank.

According to the third invention, the position of the luggage carrying section in the downward direction can be adjusted based on the data of the surrounding object image acquired by the object image acquisition section without driving the hydraulic pump. In airport high-lift trucks, the height of the luggage carrying section is once adjusted to the height of the aircraft's doorway, and then the height of the aircraft's doorway becomes lower when the aircraft is refueled, etc., and the height of the luggage carrying section is slightly lowered for fine adjustment. In such a case, it is possible to shorten the work time and save energy by switching the hydraulic control valve to lower the luggage carrying section according to gravity, rather than first adjusting the height of the luggage carrying section and then driving the stopped hydraulic pump again to lower the luggage carrying section.

In a fourth invention, in any one of the first to third inventions, the connection switching unit is connected to the baggage car loading unit so as to rise and fall together with the baggage car loading unit, and at least a portion of the connection switching unit is configured to be movable horizontally relative to the baggage car loading unit by a horizontal movement mechanism, and the control unit is configured to move the connection switching unit horizontally by controlling the drive actuator of the horizontal movement mechanism based on the acquisition result of the object image acquisition unit.

According to the fourth invention, the connection and switching unit is automatically controlled to move horizontally and accurately aligned with the entrance/exit based on the data of the surrounding object images acquired by the object image acquisition unit. This allows an airport high-lift truck to be automated in which an operator parks the truck at a designated parking position below the entrance/exit of the aircraft body, raises the baggage carrier to the height of the entrance/exit of the aircraft, and then moves the platform serving as the connection and switching unit horizontally. As a result, the horizontal control of the connection and switching unit does not require careful operation as in the past, reducing the burden on the operator.

In a fifth invention, in any one of the first to fourth inventions, the control unit is connected to a display unit that displays the vehicle's traveling direction, and the control unit is configured to create stopping guide information regarding a predetermined stopping position relative to the baggage loading/unloading area based on the acquisition result of the object image acquisition unit, and display the information on the display unit.

According to the fifth invention, the worker can easily stop the vehicle at a designated stopping position while referring to the stopping guide information displayed on the display unit. In addition, the display unit notifies the worker of obstacles in the vehicle's travel direction until the vehicle stops, so the worker can easily recognize approaching obstacles without constantly looking around. This allows the airport high-lift truck to easily stop at a designated stopping position without the need for a separate worker to guide the vehicle to the stopping position. As a result, it is possible to reduce the number of workers required for guidance and the burden on the worker driving the work vehicle.

In a sixth invention, in any one of the first to fifth inventions, the control unit includes an object image recognition unit that processes data acquired from the object image acquisition unit to recognize an object, and the object image recognition unit includes a distance image generation unit that generates a distance image from the data, an object detection unit that detects the object from the generated distance image, and a memory unit that stores a classifier used by the object image detection unit to detect the baggage loading/unloading section.

According to the sixth invention, the control unit can recognize not only the two-dimensional shape of the object but also the distance to the object by using the object image recognition unit. Then, the identifier of the baggage loading/unloading unit can be used to accurately grasp the position to the baggage loading/unloading unit that is the approach target. This allows the connection and switching unit to be accurately connected to the object storage unit. In an airport high-lift truck, the tip of the platform as the connection and switching unit can be accurately aligned with the aircraft entrance as the baggage loading/unloading unit.

In the seventh invention, in the sixth invention, the identifier includes a first identifier used when the vehicle approaches the baggage loading/unloading section while traveling, and a second identifier used when moving the connection/switching section after the vehicle stops at a predetermined stopping position relative to the baggage loading/unloading section.

According to the seventh invention, even if the appearance of the baggage loading/unloading section from the object image acquisition unit is significantly different between when the vehicle approaches the baggage loading/unloading section by driving the vehicle and when the connection switching unit is moved after the vehicle stops at a predetermined stopping position relative to the baggage loading/unloading section, the identifier is changed according to the appearance of each, so that the position of the baggage loading/unloading section can be accurately recognized in either case. In an airport high-lift truck, when the vehicle is stopped at a predetermined stopping position, if the optical axis of the object image acquisition unit is directed in the direction of travel of the vehicle, only the part of the aircraft body serving as the baggage loading/unloading section below the entrance is visible. If the entrance of the aircraft is to be viewed from this stopping position, the optical axis of the object image acquisition unit must be directed diagonally upward, but the shape of the entrance as viewed from this position of looking up is significantly different from the shape of the entrance as viewed from the front of the aircraft entrance. In this case, if an attempt is made to recognize the entrance using only an identifier with the shape of the aircraft entrance according to one of the two ways of viewing, a recognition error will occur when the baggage loading/unloading section and the platform are either in the lowered state or the raised state. Therefore, if the object image recognition unit has in advance in its memory a classifier for the shape of the aircraft entrance when viewed from above, and a classifier for the shape of the aircraft entrance when viewed from the front, the aircraft entrance can be accurately recognized whether the baggage loading section and platform are in a lowered or raised state.

In the eighth invention, in the seventh invention, the control unit is configured to switch between using the first classifier and using the second classifier based on the switching timing of a power changeover switch that switches between the power for driving the vehicle and the power for moving the connection exchange unit after the host vehicle stops at the predetermined stopping position.

According to the eighth invention, the identifier of the baggage loading/unloading section required before the vehicle stops and the identifier of the baggage loading/unloading section required when moving the connection/switching section after the vehicle stops can be automatically switched immediately before the connection/switching section starts to move. This eliminates the need for the worker to manually switch the identifier, thereby reducing the burden on the worker. In addition, there is no risk of forgetting to switch the identifier, which improves the accuracy of the work.

In a ninth invention, in any one of the first to eighth inventions, the control unit has a communication unit that wirelessly communicates with a management center, and a position information acquisition unit is connected to the control unit, and the management center transmits target position information related to the current position of the luggage loading/unloading unit to the communication unit. The control unit is configured to obtain current position information of the vehicle from the position information acquisition unit and calculate the distance to the position of the luggage loading/unloading unit based on the target position information, and to start recognizing the luggage loading/unloading unit based on the acquisition result of the object image acquisition unit when it recognizes that the vehicle has approached a predetermined distance from the luggage loading/unloading unit.

According to the ninth invention, it is possible to prevent the recognition of the baggage loading/unloading section based on the results of acquisition by the object image acquisition unit until the vehicle approaches a predetermined distance from the baggage loading/unloading section. As a result, even if there are multiple other baggage loading/unloading sections similar in shape to the target baggage loading/unloading section, the control unit can accurately recognize only the target baggage loading/unloading section without being confused by the other baggage loading/unloading sections. As a result, it is possible to improve the accuracy of the work and shorten the work time. In an aviation high lift truck, it is necessary to approach the target airplane among multiple airplanes of the same manufacturer and model parked at the airport, but even in such a case, it is possible to accurately recognize only the overall shape of the target airplane and the shape of the aircraft entrance/exit.

In the tenth invention, in the ninth invention, the communication unit is configured to receive loading/unloading section information from the management center, the information including information regarding the position and shape of the entrance/exit at the baggage loading/unloading section, and the control unit is configured to control the movement of the connection/switching unit to match the position of the entrance/exit based on the loading/unloading section information.

According to the tenth invention, it is possible to constantly obtain the latest information on the position and shape of the entrance of the target baggage loading/unloading section from the management center. As a result, even if the baggage loading/unloading section at the originally planned location is suddenly changed to another baggage loading/unloading section, the entrance of the other baggage loading/unloading section can be easily recognized and the connection/switching section can be moved accurately. In the case of airport high-lift trucks, the parking location of the target airplane within the airport may suddenly change due to a problem or the like. Even if it is different from the parking location planned before departing from the in-flight catering factory for the airport, if the new parking location of the target airplane is received from the airport management center immediately before or immediately after entering the airport, it is possible to direct the vehicle to the new parking location without hesitation.

In an eleventh invention, in the tenth invention, the control unit is configured to stop driving the drive actuator when the entrance is not recognized by the object detection unit when the connection switching unit is moved by controlling the drive actuator from a position where the entrance is not included in the data acquired by the object image acquisition unit to the position of the entrance based on the loading/unloading unit information.

According to the eleventh invention, the connection switching unit starts moving with the position of the entrance/exit of the luggage loading/unloading unit included in the loading/unloading unit information transmitted from the management center as the target, and if the control unit cannot recognize the shape of the entrance/exit included in the loading/unloading unit information even after the connection switching unit has moved to the position of the entrance/exit, the movement of the connection switching unit can be stopped at that point even if the stroke end of the drive actuator has not been reached. This makes it possible to prevent the connection switching unit from moving abnormally too far even if an error has occurred in the control unit's recognition of the entrance/exit. As a result, it is possible to prevent the connection switching unit from hitting the luggage loading/unloading unit and damaging it, thereby ensuring safety.

According to the work vehicle of the present invention, the luggage carrying section and the connection and switching section are automatically controlled to move based on the results of the acquisition of surrounding object image data by the object image acquisition section. In particular, since this object image acquisition section is provided in the luggage carrying section and the connection and switching section that move relative to the chassis, data on the object image (target object) to be moved can be accurately acquired, thereby realizing highly accurate movement control. Furthermore, since the movement control is performed without hesitation based on such objective object image data, not only the accuracy but also the speed of the luggage transfer work can be greatly improved.
Furthermore, even if a positional discrepancy occurs between the height position of the luggage carrying section and the height position of the aircraft's entrance/exit after the height position of the luggage carrying section has been temporarily adjusted to the height of the aircraft's entrance/exit, the control section has the above-mentioned characteristics, so that the positional discrepancy can be recognized by the object image acquisition section and the position can be automatically corrected.
As a result, the workload of the workers is greatly reduced since the conventional alignment operation is no longer necessary.

FIG. 1 is a plan view showing a travel path of a high lift truck to which the present invention is applied. FIG. 2 is an enlarged plan view of the main part of FIG. 1 , which is the vicinity of the airplane. 1A and 1B are diagrams showing the above-mentioned truck when connected to the aircraft entrance/exit, in which (a) is a side view and (b) is a plan view with the eaves portion omitted. FIG. 2 is a partially enlarged perspective view of the connection switching section of a high lift truck as viewed from below. FIG. 2 is a partially enlarged perspective view of the connection exchange section of the high lift truck as viewed from above. 1A and 1B are enlarged perspective views showing a power transmission mechanism of a gang plate unit of a high lift truck, in which FIG. 1A is a perspective view seen from the left side of the vehicle, and FIG. FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing a control system of a high lift truck. This is a flowchart showing the control from when a high-lift truck enters an airport to when it connects to the aircraft entrance/exit. 10 is a flowchart showing the control of the control unit regarding the search for an aircraft entrance/exit and the display of stopping guide information after the aircraft entrance/exit is recognized. 3 is a camera image diagram taken by a first camera and a second camera with optical axes oriented horizontally while the high lift truck is moving in the direction of arrow C in FIG. 2 . FIG. FIG. 3 is a camera image diagram taken by a first camera and a second camera with optical axes directed obliquely upward while the high lift truck is moving in the direction of arrow D in FIG. 2 . 3 is a diagram showing camera images taken by a first camera and a second camera with optical axes directed diagonally upward when the high lift truck moves to the stopping position De in FIG. 2 . FIG. FIG. 3 is a camera image taken by a third camera while the high lift truck is raising the loading platform at the stopping position De in FIG. 2 . Fig. 13 is a flowchart showing how the control unit controls the lifting of the loading platform; Fig. 14 is a camera image taken by a third camera; 3 is a camera image taken by the third camera when the high lift truck raises the platform to the height of the vehicle body entrance/exit at the stopping position De in FIG. 2 . FIG. FIG. 16 is a camera image taken by the third camera when the connection switching unit is moved horizontally from FIG. 15 to bring the bridge plate into contact with the floor surface of the aircraft entrance/exit.

Below, an embodiment of the present invention applied to an airport high-lift truck (hereinafter simply referred to as "truck") 1 will be described with reference to the drawings. Note that in the following description, the front-rear, left-right, and up-down directions refer to the directions as seen by a worker in the cab of truck 1.

As shown in FIG. 1, the truck 1 as a work vehicle loads in-flight meal carts containing in-flight meals at an in-flight meal factory 10 outside the airport, travels on public roads and within the airport as indicated by arrow A, moves to a waiting position W, and waits for the arrival of the target airplane 11. After the airplane 11 arrives, the truck 1 moves from the waiting position W in the order of arrows B, C, and D, stops, and a connection operation is performed to load and unload the in-flight meal carts at the aircraft entrance/exit 12 of the airplane 11. The truck 1 is driven by an operator, and while moving, the presence or absence of obstacles is also monitored by a camera (object image acquisition unit) mounted on the truck 1. In particular, when the truck 1 moves within a radius L1 centered on the aircraft entrance/exit 12 as shown in FIG. 2 and approaches the aircraft entrance/exit 12 (arrows C and D), the target stopping position is displayed on a display unit (display) mounted on the vehicle using data from the camera, and the truck can move to this position as a target, and the above-mentioned connection operation is performed after the truck stops. The display unit also displays the airplane 11 and its surroundings through the camera, and the shooting angle is appropriately controlled to prevent the aircraft entrance 12, which is located at a high position, from being removed from the camera image when approaching the parking position De as in the area of arrow D. The radius L1 is set so as to include the surrounding area of the airplane 11 parked at the parking spot of the boarding gate 16, with the aircraft entrance 12 of the airplane 11 to be connected as the center, but not to include the surrounding area of the airplane 19 parked at the adjacent boarding gate 18 (see FIG. 1).

As shown in FIG. 3(a), the truck 1 comprises a drivable chassis 2, a lifting mechanism 3 provided on the chassis 2, and a loading platform 4 provided on the chassis 2 and raised and lowered relative to the chassis 2 by the lifting mechanism 3. When the truck 1 stops at the above-mentioned stopping position De, the loading platform 4 is raised vertically upward (arrow E1) and controlled to connect to the vehicle entrance/exit 12. When the connected state is reached, movement control (arrows E2, E3, and E4 in FIG. 3(b) or arrow E5 in FIG. 3(a)) described below is also performed.

The chassis 2 comprises a frame 200 extending forward and backward, a cab 201 provided at the front of the frame 200 where an operator drives, and running tires 202 provided on the frame 200. A torii-shaped stopper 203 is erected behind the cab 201.

The lifting mechanism 3 includes a pair of left and right outer links 300, 300, a pair of left and right inner links 301, 301 provided inside the outer links 300, 300, and a hydraulic lifting cylinder 302 attached between the inner links 301, 301. The outer link 300 and the inner link 301 are pivotally connected to each other at their central portions by a link shaft 303.

The loading platform 4 comprises a baggage carrier 41 that houses the in-flight meal carts, and a connection and exchange section 42 that is provided at the front of the baggage carrier 41 and is used to switch the in-flight meal carts between the airplane 11. The connection and exchange section 42 comprises a base section 43 that can move relatively in the left-right direction with respect to the baggage carrier 41 (chassis 2) by a slide mechanism 432, and a platform 44 that is provided at the front of the base section 43 and serves as a runway between the aircraft entrance/exit 12 and the baggage carrier 41. The airplane 11 is the section (baggage loading/unloading section) that is the destination or source of the in-flight meal cart to be switched.

As shown in FIG. 4, the baggage loading section 41 includes a storage box 410 for storing an in-flight meal cart, a pair of left and right front and rear guide rails 411, 411 that are provided at the bottom of the storage box 410 and extend forward and backward with a U-shaped cross section, and a first hydraulic slide cylinder 412 disposed between the front and rear guide rails 411, 411. Shutters 413 (see FIG. 5) are provided at the front and rear of the storage box 410.

The upper ends of the inner link 301 and the outer link 300 are connected to the front and rear guide rails 411. Specifically, the upper ends of the pair of left and right inner links 301, 301 are connected to each other via the inner upper end shaft 304, and the rolling rollers 305, 305 attached to both ends of the shaft 304 are rollably fitted into the front and rear guide rails 411, 411. The same is true for the outer link 300, although not shown. The tube of the first slide cylinder 412 is connected to the inner upper end shaft 304, and the rod is connected to a cross member 411c installed on the pair of left and right front and rear guide rails 411, 411. The expansion and contraction of the cylinder 412 moves the luggage carrier 41 relative to the inner link 301 and the outer link 300 (chassis 2) in the front-rear direction. The lower end of the outer link 300 is pivotally connected to the frame 200, and the lower end of the inner link 301 is slidably connected to the frame 200. The lifting cylinder 302 can be extended and retracted to raise and lower the platform 4 while keeping it parallel to the chassis 2.

The base portion 43 has a tunnel portion 430 consisting of a bottom portion 430a, left and right side portions 430b, 430b, and a ceiling portion 430c, and a eaves portion 436 provided on top of the ceiling portion 430c.

In the tunnel section 430, left and right guide rails 431 extending left and right are provided on the underside of the bottom section 430a and the rear side of the ceiling section 430c, and upper and lower guide rails 434, 434 extending up and down are provided on the front side of each of the left and right side sections 430b. The left and right guide rails 431 of the bottom section 430a are strip members fixed to the bottom section 430a, and are placed on roller members (not shown) provided on the upper surface of the front and rear guide rails 411. The left and right guide rails 431 of the ceiling section 430c are channel members fixed to the rear surface of the ceiling section 430c, and are fitted into roller members (not shown) provided on the upper edge of the front end of the storage box 410. The upper and lower guide rails 434 are formed of channel members, and are provided so that the side groove portions face inward on the left and right.

The eaves 436 is formed to cover the upper part of the PF44 and extend forward, and a first camera 437a and a second camera 437b that capture images of the area in front of the truck 1 are attached to its front end. The first camera 437a and the second camera 437b are integrated to form a stereo camera, and the direction of their optical axes can be changed up and down by an electric camera rotation motor 438. In addition, a third camera 439, a monocular camera that captures an area at the same height as the tunnel section 430, is fixed to the center position on the left and right side of the front side of the ceiling section 430c with its optical axis facing forward of the vehicle, and the camera image includes the PF44.

The slide mechanism 432 has a ball screw (not shown) that is arranged to span the upper ends of the pair of left and right front and rear guide rails 411 in the left-right direction, and an electric slide motor 433 that rotates and drives the ball screw and is arranged on the outer surface of one of the front and rear guide rails 411. The nut portion of the ball screw of the slide mechanism 432 is connected to the underside of the bottom 430a of the tunnel section 430. When the slide motor 433 is driven, the base section 43 is moved left and right relative to the front and rear guide rails 411, and the PF 44 arranged in front of the tunnel section 430 is also moved left and right together with the tunnel section 430. Note that the state shown in the figure is a state in which the connection switching section 42 is moved to the left relative to the baggage car loading section 41.

4 and 5, the platform (hereinafter simply referred to as "PF") 44 has a base end PF440, an intermediate PF441 provided in front of the base end PF440 and slidable back and forth relative to the base end PF440, and a tip end PF442 provided in front of the intermediate PF441 and rotatable left and right relative to the intermediate PF441. The PF44 is provided on the left and right sides of the base end PF440 so as to be vertically movable relative to the vertical guide rails 434 via support members 435.
The support member 435 is formed by assembling three frame members, a base, a vertical side, and an oblique side, into a triangular shape. A vertical side roller portion (not shown) is provided on the outer surface of the vertical side frame member, and the vertical side roller portion is fitted into the groove portion of the upper and lower guide rails 434.

The base end PF440 is a flat plate member having a substantially rectangular shape in a plan view, and is fixed in a state of being clamped to the upper edge of the frame material at the bottom of the left and right support members 435. A stay 446 protruding downward is provided at the bottom of the base end PF440, and the stay 446 abuts against a torii-shaped stopper 203 (see FIG. 3(a)) when the loading platform 4 descends. As a result, the base end PF440 of the loading platform 4 maintains the stopped height position, while the baggage vehicle loading section 41 can be further lowered to a stored state. In addition, a stopper (not shown) is provided at the lower end of the upper and lower guide rails 434 to prevent the rollers of the support members 435 from falling off the lower ends of the upper and lower guide rails 434.
A hydraulic second slide cylinder 443 is provided at the bottom of the base end PF 440. A tube of the cylinder 443 is fixed to a cross member 443a that is installed between a pair of left and right support members 435, 435.

The intermediate PF 441 is a plate member that is approximately square in plan view, and is fixed at both left and right end edges in a state where it is supported by the PF rail member 441a that is U-shaped and opens outward and extends forward and backward. An intermediate bottom plate 441b of approximately the same shape as the intermediate PF 441 is fixed at a predetermined interval to the underside of the left and right PF rail members 441a, and the intermediate PF 441 and the intermediate bottom plate 441b that are integrated via the PF rail member 441a are provided below the base end PF 440. In addition, a bottom roller portion 435a with an axis in the left-right direction is provided on the inner surface of the bottom frame material of the support member 435, and this bottom roller portion 435a is supported by the support member 435 by being fitted into the U-shaped portion of the PF rail member 441a. The rod tip of the second slide cylinder 443 is attached to the underside of the intermediate bottom plate 441b, and the extension and contraction of the second slide cylinder 443 allows the intermediate PF 441 to move relative to the base end PF 440 in the front-rear direction.

The tip PF 442 has a first PF 450 rotatably connected to the intermediate PF 441 , and a second PF 451 rotatably connected to the first PF 450 .
The first PF 450 is a plate member having a generally rectangular shape in plan view and a narrower width than the intermediate PF 441, and a portion thereof excluding its tip is inserted between the intermediate PF 441 and the intermediate bottom plate 441b. A first rotating shaft 445 having an axial center in the vertical direction is fixed to the base end of the first PF 450 (see FIG. 3B), and the upper and lower ends of the first rotating shaft 445 are supported by the PF 441 and boss portions (not shown) of the intermediate bottom plate 441b.
The first PF 450 is adapted to be rotated left and right in a horizontal plane relative to the intermediate PF 441 around a first pivot shaft 445 by a hydraulic first pivot motor 444 (see FIG. 8, omitted in FIG. 4) provided on the intermediate bottom plate 441b.

The second PF 451 is a plate member having an approximately trapezoidal shape, and is supported on a second rotating shaft 453 provided at the tip of the first PF 450. The second PF 451 is rotated left and right in a horizontal plane relative to the first PF 450 around the second rotating shaft 453 by a hydraulic second rotating motor 452 (see Figure 8) provided on its underside.
A bridge plate unit 455 is provided in front of the second PF 451. The bridge plate unit 455 has a bridge plate 456 provided in front of the second PF 451, and is rotatable from a position in which the bridge plate 456 stands up relative to the PF 44 to a position substantially the same as the horizontal position of the PF 44. At least when the loading platform 4 is in the ascending operation, the shutter 413 provided on the storage box 410 is in a closed state.

Here, as shown in Fig. 6(a) and Fig. 6(b), the rotation mechanism of the cross plate 456 includes a power transmission mechanism 457 that rotates the tip of the cross plate 456 up and down relative to the second PF 451, and an electric cross plate rotation motor 458 that is provided in the second PF 451 and drives the power transmission mechanism 457. The power transmission mechanism 457 includes a drive sprocket 457a connected to the output shaft of the cross plate rotation motor 458, a driven sprocket 457b on the cross plate 456 side, a chain 457c wound around the drive sprocket 457a and the driven sprocket 457b, a first disk 457d that rotates together with the driven sprocket 457b, and a second disk 457e that is connected to the rotation shaft of the cross plate 456 and is arranged to face the first disk 457d and can rotate relative to the first disk 457d.

The first disk 457d has an engagement protrusion 457f protruding toward the second disk 457e. The second disk 457e has an engagement long hole 457g formed along the circumferential direction to engage with the engagement protrusion 457f. When the drive sprocket 457a is driven by the cross plate rotation motor 458, the driving force is transmitted by the chain 457c to rotate the engagement protrusion 457f, and the cross plate 456 rotates with the rotating engagement protrusion 457f and the circumferential end of the engagement long hole 457g in contact with each other, except for the initial and final stages of rotation. In addition, the second PF 451, which is located near the cross plate unit 455, is provided with a pair of infrared or ultrasonic distance sensors on the left and right, and in FIG. 6, the second distance sensor 459b provided on the left side of the second PF 451 is shown as a representative example (the first distance sensor 459a is provided on the right side).

When the truck 1 having the above configuration is traveling (for example, in the range of arrows A or B in Figure 1), the platform 4 is lowered and stored, the PF 44 is contracted, and the bridge plate 456 is also raised relative to the PF 44.

The control system for truck 1 will be explained with reference to Figure 8.

The truck 1 is equipped with a control unit 220 that receives an activation signal based on image data from the first camera 437a and the second camera 437b, or the third camera 439, and performs various controls to properly connect the loading platform 4 to the airplane 11. The control unit 220 is equipped with an object recognition unit 221 that performs object recognition based on the image data, an equipment control unit 226 that outputs a control signal to a control valve 215 that drives the motors 444, 452... and the cylinders 412, 443, 302, etc., a chassis control unit 227 that controls the chassis 2, and a communication unit 228 that communicates with airport facilities to acquire information.

The object recognition unit 221 includes a distance image generation unit 222 connected to the first camera 437a and the second camera 437b, an object detection unit 223 connected to the generation unit 222 and the third camera 439, a judgment processing unit 224 connected to the distance image generation unit 222 and the object detection unit 223 so that signals can be input and output, and a memory unit 225 connected to the judgment processing unit 224 and the object detection unit 223 so that signals can be input and output. Furthermore, the judgment processing unit 224 is also connected to the equipment control unit 226 so that signals can be input and output, and has a processing function based on the detection data acquired by the sensors 459a, 459b, and 460, and also has a function of outputting various data in the object recognition unit 221 to the equipment control unit 226.

The distance image generator 222 is connected to the first camera 437a and the second camera 437b, and is capable of generating a distance image containing distance information to an object by stereo matching processing based on a pair of image data sent from these cameras. The stereo matching processing is a process in which parallax is found by matching corresponding pixels between reference image data captured by one camera and comparison image data captured by the other camera, and the distance between both cameras and the object contained in the image is calculated from the parallax. In order to evaluate the similarity between images, the stereo matching processing uses a block matching method in which an area is cut out from the images to be compared, and the sum of the brightness differences (SAD: Sum of Absolute Difference) for that area is calculated.

The object detection unit 223 is connected to the distance image generation unit 222 and the third camera 439, and in addition to the data of the distance image generated by the distance image generation unit 222, data of the image without distance information acquired by the third camera 439 is also input. The object detection unit 223 raster scans the detection window in the input image and calculates the feature amount in each detection window area. In this embodiment, the HOG (Histograms of Oriented Gradients) feature amount is used as this feature amount. The HOG feature amount is an amount calculated by creating a plurality of blocks in which the gradient direction of brightness in a local area (cell) of the distance image is histogrammed based on the gradient strength of brightness, normalizing the histogram of each block, and then concatenating them.
The object detection unit 223 inputs the above feature amounts to one of three types of classifiers M1, M2, and M3 (described later) read from the storage unit 225, and sends the output score to the judgment processing unit 224.

In this embodiment, the third camera 439 is a camera that does not have distance information due to differences in usage between the first camera 437a and the second camera 437b. That is, the first camera 437a and the second camera 437b are used when the truck 1 moves from the standby position W toward the vehicle entrance/exit 12 by the operator, and require distance information for the object recognition unit 221 to recognize the distance to the vehicle entrance/exit 12 and the presence or absence of an obstacle.
On the other hand, the third camera 439 is used when connecting the connection/exchange unit 42 to the vehicle entrance/exit 12 after the truck 1 stops, and does not require distance information as long as it can recognize the positional relationship between the vehicle entrance/exit 12 and the tip of the PF 44 two-dimensionally, up and down, left and right. The third camera 439 is provided on the ceiling part 430c of the tunnel part 430 in order to align the vehicle entrance/exit 12 and the tip of the PF 44 by including both the vehicle entrance/exit 12 and the PF 44 in the camera image, but at the mounting position of the third camera 439, even if distance information can be measured, it is difficult to recognize the change in the distance between the tip of the PF 44 and the vehicle entrance/exit 12 relative to the tunnel part 430 (because the distance relationship between the third camera 439 and the vehicle entrance/exit 12 does not change due to the expansion and contraction of the PF 44). Therefore, in this embodiment, the change in the distance between the tip of the PF 44 and the vehicle entrance/exit 12 is detected by the first distance sensor 459a and the second distance sensor 459b.

Three types of classifiers for recognizing the aircraft entrance/exit 12 based on image data acquired by the camera are stored in advance in the storage unit 225. These three types of classifiers M1, M2, and M3 refer to a distant classifier M1 that is referenced at a position away from the aircraft entrance/exit 12 (for example, in the range of movement indicated by the arrow C in FIG. 2), a close classifier M2 that is referenced when approaching the aircraft entrance/exit 12 (for example, in the range of movement indicated by the arrow D), and a horizontal classifier M3 that is referenced when moving in the directions indicated by the arrows E1 to E4 in FIG.
The three types of classifiers M1, M2, and M3 are programs in which parameters of judgment criteria are pre-trained by an SVM (Support Vector Machine) using training data consisting of HOG feature values of a large number of "aircraft entrance/exit" images captured by the cameras 437a, 437b, and 439 and HOG feature values of a large number of "non-aircraft entrance/exit" images in which the aircraft entrance/exit 12 is not captured. For example, the "aircraft entrance/exit" images are pre-trained as a positive value of +1, and the "non-aircraft entrance/exit" images are pre-trained as a negative value of -1. When using each classifier, each classifier is set to output a score greater than 0 and less than 1 if the aircraft entrance/exit 12 is captured in the area of a detection window that raster scans the camera image, and to output a score greater than -1 and less than 0 if the aircraft entrance/exit 12 is not captured. The higher the recognition accuracy of the aircraft entrance/exit 12, the closer the value is to 1, and the lower the recognition accuracy, the closer the value is to 0.

In addition, the three types of classifiers M1, M2, and M3 have different types of image data for learning. The image data for learning of the distant classifier M1 is image data from the first camera 437a and the second camera 437b whose optical axis is directed horizontally, and the image data for learning of the close classifier M2 is image data from the first camera 437a and the second camera 437b whose optical axis is directed diagonally upward. Furthermore, the image data for learning of the horizontal classifier M3 is image data from the third camera 439. Note that the "aircraft entrance" image to be learned may be an image of only the aircraft entrance 12 (door 13), or may be a combination of the aircraft entrance 12 and the reinforcing plate 14 provided directly below the aircraft entrance 12.

The judgment processing unit 224 processes the output value of the object detection unit 223 based on the identifiers M1, M2, and M3, and sends an activation signal to the equipment control unit 226. Specifically, when based on the distant identifier M1, if the value is equal to or greater than the first positive threshold, which is the limit value for recognizing the aircraft entrance/exit 12, the judgment processing unit 224 sends the judgment result that the aircraft entrance/exit 12 has been recognized to the equipment control unit 226, and when based on the close identifier M2, if the value is equal to or greater than the second positive threshold, which is the limit value for recognizing the aircraft entrance/exit 12, the judgment processing unit 224 sends the judgment result that the aircraft entrance/exit 12 has been recognized to the equipment control unit 226. Also, when based on the horizontal identifier M3, if the value is equal to or greater than the fourth positive threshold, which is the limit value for recognizing the aircraft entrance/exit 12, the judgment processing unit 224 sends the judgment result that the aircraft entrance/exit 12 has been recognized to the equipment control unit 226. In addition, when the output value based on the distant classifier M1 has fallen to a predetermined third threshold (>first threshold) that is close to the first threshold but has not yet reached the limit value for recognition, the judgment processing unit 224 controls the classifier used in the object detection unit 223 to be switched from the distant classifier M1 to the close classifier M2.

Next, the equipment control unit 226 is electrically connected to the communication unit 228, the position information acquisition unit 229, the first distance sensor 459a, the second distance sensor 459b, and the ground sensor 460 in addition to the object recognition unit 221, and is capable of autonomously controlling each electric or hydraulic actuator mainly based on information output from these. The equipment control unit 226 is also electrically connected to the speaker 201a and the display unit 201b, and outputs the recognition results of obstacles around the truck 1 and the vehicle entrance/exit 12.
In addition, the equipment control unit 226 is electrically connected to an equipment operation unit 230 operated by an operator, and the operator can manually operate each actuator by sending an operation signal from this equipment operation unit 230 to the equipment control unit 226.
Furthermore, the equipment control unit 226 is electrically connected to the chassis control unit 227 so as to be capable of inputting and outputting signals.

The chassis control unit 227 sends operating signals to the engine 210 and transmission 211 of the truck 1 to control their drive, and performs driving control such as changing the speed of the driving force of the engine 210 through the transmission 211 and transmitting it to the running tires 202, and control switching of the PTO 212 attached to the transmission 211.

The communication unit 228 obtains aircraft information of the aircraft 11 to be connected (horizontal coordinate target position information for the aircraft entrance/exit 12 to be connected among multiple aircraft entrances, model information including the type and size of the aircraft, the number of the boarding gate 16 to be arrived at, the height from the ground to the aircraft entrance/exit, the shape of the aircraft entrance/exit, etc.) via wireless communication from the airport control tower 15 (see Figure 1) and sends it to the equipment control unit 226.
The target position information is information calculated in the control tower 15 based on the above-mentioned model information, relative position information for the nose wheel of the airplane 11 with respect to the aircraft entrance/exit 12 to be connected, and horizontal coordinate information of the parking spot (the airplane nose wheel stopping position) corresponding to the arriving boarding gate 16.
The height from the ground to the aircraft entrance and the shape of the aircraft entrance correspond to the "carry-in/out area information" in the claims.

The position information acquisition unit 229 can receive signals transmitted from positioning satellites to obtain position information of the truck 1, and transmits the position information to the equipment control unit 226. In addition, the position information of the truck 1 obtained by the position information acquisition unit 229 can also be transmitted to the control tower 15 (see FIG. 1) by the communication unit 228.
By using the position information of the traveling truck 1 and the above-mentioned target position information, the equipment control unit 226 can calculate the distance of the radius L1 of the aircraft entrance 12 of the airplane 11 and grasp the position and timing for transmitting and receiving with the control tower 15. Furthermore, the distance L from the position of the truck 1 to the aircraft entrance 12 is continuously calculated by the equipment control unit 226, and the equipment control unit 226 can continuously send information on the distance L to the judgment processing unit 224 of the object recognition unit 221.

The sensors 459a, 459b, and 460 are used when the second PF 451 approaches the aircraft entrance 12 during the connection work between the loading platform 4 of the parked truck 1 and the aircraft entrance 12. The first distance sensor 459a and the second distance sensor 459b each detect the distance from the tip of the second PF 451 to the airplane 11 and send the detection result (distance data) to the equipment control unit 226. The ground sensor 460 is a pressure sensor or a light and dark sensor provided on the underside of the tip of the bridge plate 456, and detects that the tip of the bridge plate 456 has touched the floor surface of the airplane 11 when the bridge plate 456 rotates up and down, and outputs a signal to the equipment control unit 226, which stops the drive of the bridge plate rotation motor 458.

The equipment control unit 226 controls each hydraulic actuator 412, 413, ... by outputting a control signal to the control valve 215. The control valve 215 is a multiple hydraulic valve unit, and the hydraulic pump 213 is driven by the power extracted by the PTO 212, so that hydraulic oil in the hydraulic oil tank 214 is supplied to the hydraulic actuators via the control valve 215.

The speaker 201a and the display unit 201b are provided in the cab 201, and the operator driving the truck 1 can easily stop the truck 1 at a predetermined stopping position De by moving the truck 1 toward the aircraft entrance/exit 12 of the airplane 11 according to the stopping guide information displayed on the display unit 201b and the alarm sound from the speaker 201a. In addition to the speaker 201a and the display unit 201b, the cab 201 is also provided with an equipment operation unit 230 that controls the lifting and horizontal movement of the loading platform 4, and a PTO switch 231 that switches the PTO 212 (outputting the driving force to the running tires 202 side or the hydraulic pump 213 side).

Next, the operation of connecting the truck 1 to the aircraft entrance/exit 12 of the airplane 11 will be explained with reference to the flowchart in Figure 8.

In this embodiment, the truck 1 operates in a first working state (S0-S2) in which the platform 4 is lowered and stored while driving to enter the airport, a second working state (S3) in which the truck drives while displaying images of other vehicles working in the airport and moves to a distance of radius L1 from the aircraft entrance/exit 12, a third working state (S4-S10) in which the truck approaches the aircraft entrance/exit 12 further while referring to the displayed stopping guide information, and a fourth working state (S11-S23) in which the truck stops and connects the platform 4 to the aircraft entrance/exit. Note that the first working state is the range of arrow A in FIG. 1, the second working state is the range of arrow B in the same figure, the third working state is the range of arrows C and D in the same figure, and the fourth working state is the state of arrows E1, E2, E3, E4, and E5 in FIG. 3.

In the first working state, the equipment control unit 226 judges whether the truck 1 has entered the destination airport based on the current position of the truck 1 sent from the position information acquisition unit 229. For example, the equipment control unit 226 judges that the truck 1 has entered the airport when the current position of the truck 1 is inside the airport more than the airport entrance/exit 17 (see FIG. 1) (S1). After the equipment control unit 226 judges that the truck 1 has entered the airport, it receives aircraft information of the airplane 11 to be connected by wireless communication with the control tower 15 (S2). The aircraft information includes target position information, model information, the number of the boarding gate 16 to be arrived at, etc., and by the truck 1 receiving the aircraft information early, it is possible to accurately display the desired stopping position De that can be handled at least in the third working state and the fourth working state. Therefore, the operator driving the truck 1 can drive the truck 1 to a suitable stopping position De with peace of mind.

In the second work state, after receiving the aircraft information (S2), the truck travels while monitoring surrounding obstacles with the first camera 437a and the second camera 437b, and moves to a position that is a radius L1 away from the aircraft entrance/exit 12. The equipment control unit 226 calculates the distance L between the current position of the truck 1 sent from the position information acquisition unit 229 and the position of the aircraft entrance/exit 12 based on the aircraft information, and compares the distance L with the radius L1. If it is determined that the distance is less than the radius L1 (S3), the second work state is completed. If the truck 1 mistakenly moves toward the airplane 18, it is not determined that the distance is less than the radius L1, so the second work state is not completed and the truck does not move to the third work state.

When the system transitions to the third working state (S4 to S10), a search and display step (S4) is performed to accurately search for the vehicle entrance 12 and display stop guide information indicating the stopping position De of the truck 1 after the vehicle entrance 12 is recognized, and a display adjustment step (S5 to S10) is performed to maintain a good display state of the stop guide information. Each step (S4 to S10) in the third working state is repeated sequentially while the truck 1 is moving, and in the display adjustment step, optical axis change control is also performed so that the elevation angle of the first camera 437a and the second camera 437b can be changed when the truck 1 approaches the vehicle entrance 12.

After the truck 1 is stopped in a suitable position, the system transitions to a fourth working state (S11 to S23), in which the platform 4 is connected to the vehicle body entrance/exit 12. In the fourth working state, a platform lifting step (S11 to S15) is performed in which the platform 4 is lifted by the lifting mechanism 3, a left-right adjustment step (S16 to S19) is performed in which the left-right position of the platform 4 is adjusted, and a front-rear adjustment step (S20 to S23) is performed in which the front-rear position of the platform 4 is adjusted.

In the third and fourth work states described above, multiple controls are performed using output data from cameras 437a, 437b, 439, etc., which will now be described.

As shown in FIG. 10, the search and display step (S4) includes search substeps (S41 to S45) for identifying the vehicle entrance/exit 12, and adjustment substeps (S46 to S48e) for displaying parking guide information based on the data acquired in the substeps.

After the truck 1 moves to a position less than the radius L1 of the vehicle entrance/exit 12 (S3), in the search substep (S41-S46), a pair of image data acquired by the first camera 437a and the second camera 437b is input to the distance image generating unit 222 (S41), and a distance image is generated by stereo matching processing (S42). This distance image data is input to the object detection unit 223, and the object detection unit 223 performs processing to narrow down the detection candidate area of the vehicle entrance/exit 12 (S43-S45). Specifically, the judgment processing unit 224 uses the information on the distance L that has been continuously calculated by the equipment control unit 226 and sent from the equipment control unit 226 since before the third work state, and judges an area within the range of the radius distance L±Lm from the vehicle entrance/exit 12 from the generated distance image as a detection candidate area (S44). Upon receiving this judgment signal from the judgment processing unit 224, the object detection unit 223 raster scans the detection window within the detection candidate area and calculates the HOG feature amount in each detection window area (S45). This provides input data that can be input to the program of the far-field classifier M1 or the close-field classifier M2. By narrowing down the detection candidate area as described above while generating a distance image of a wide area by the cameras 437a and 437, areas (distance images) in which the aircraft entrance/exit 12 clearly does not exist can be excluded from the scanning target in advance, and the aircraft entrance/exit 12 can be recognized with high accuracy in a short time. The allowable range Lm is set to a value that takes into account the error of the position information received by the position information acquisition unit 229. For example, if there is an average error of about 10 m in the position detection accuracy of the position information acquisition unit 229, Lm is set to 10 m.

When the raster scan is completed and the process proceeds from the search sub-steps (S41 to S45) to the adjustment sub-steps (S46 to S48e) for displaying the parking guide information, the determination processing unit 224 determines the classifier in the storage unit 225 that the object detection unit 223 reads (S46). If the truck 1 has just entered inside the area of radius L1 of the vehicle entrance/exit 12 and has not been changed from the initial state (far-field classifier M1), the object detection unit 223 sends the recognition results (positive or negative values) in each area to the determination processing unit 224 based on each HOG feature input to the far-field classifier M1. The determination processing unit 224 searches for and extracts areas whose output values are positive and equal to or greater than the first threshold (S47a). Furthermore, the equipment control unit 226, which receives the determination result that the vehicle entrance/exit 12 has been recognized by finding an area equal to or greater than the first threshold value from the determination processing unit 224, displays the recognition mark H surrounding the area determined to be equal to or greater than the first threshold value (the area recognized as the vehicle entrance/exit 12) and the target left/right lines I, I and target front/rear lines J, J based on the distance to the area on the display unit 201b (S47c). In addition, the equipment control unit 226 also displays the vehicle position line K, which serves as a mark for aligning the target front/rear lines J, J, on the display unit 201. These target left/right lines I, I, target front/rear lines J, J, and vehicle position line K become the stopping guide information.
When there are a plurality of regions that are determined to have an output value equal to or greater than the first threshold value, it is preferable to display the recognition mark H in the region with the maximum output value.

The worker can achieve highly accurate and efficient connection control of the loading platform 4 in the fourth work state (S11 to S23) by parking the truck 1 so that the recognition mark H is located between the two target left-right lines I, I, and the vehicle position line K indicating the position of the truck 1 is located between the two target front-rear lines J, J. On the other hand, if an area equal to or larger than the first threshold is not found, the judgment processing unit 224 sends a judgment result to the equipment control unit 226 that the vehicle entrance/exit 12 could not be recognized, and the equipment control unit 226 displays an error message on the display unit 201b (S47d).

Here, the state in which the recognition mark H, the target left and right lines I, I, and the target front and rear lines J, J are displayed on the display unit 201b will be described with reference to FIG. 9. Note that FIG. 9 shows camera images taken by the first camera 437a and the second camera 437b, with their optical axes oriented horizontally, when the truck 1 enters the area of radius L1 from the vehicle entrance/exit 12 and moves.

When the vehicle entrance/exit 12 is recognized by the object recognition unit 221, a recognition mark H is displayed, along with a pair of target left-right lines I, I extending in the vertical direction, a pair of target front-rear lines J, J extending in the vertical direction, and a vehicle position line K extending in the horizontal direction. The target left-right lines I, I are displayed symmetrically with respect to the left-right center line in the camera image of the display unit 201b, i.e., the left-right center of the truck 1, and the left-right lines I, I each correspond to the left and right ends of the crossing plate 456 that has moved left and right in the connection exchange unit 42 that can move left and right.

The width of the lines I, I can be adjusted according to the distance from the first camera 437a and the second camera 437b to the vehicle entrance/exit 12. As described above, the left-right width set based on the maximum left-right movable position of the bridge plate 456 is set to be smaller according to the reduction ratio of the left-right width of the vehicle entrance/exit 12, which becomes smaller in the camera image the further away from the vehicle entrance/exit 12. As a result, the operator driving the truck 1 can stop the truck 1 at the desired position by steering the truck 1 so that the recognition mark H of the vehicle entrance/exit 12 falls within the line width of the target left-right lines I, I, and the loading platform 4 can be well connected to the vehicle entrance/exit 12 by each control in the fourth work state. The desired position is the preferred stopping position De in this embodiment.

Furthermore, the target front and rear lines J, J are set so that when the truck 1 is stopped at the desired position (preferred stopping position De) described above, the vehicle position line K falls within the line width, and when the truck 1 is far from the vehicle entrance/exit 12, it is located above the vehicle position line K, and as the truck 1 is brought closer to the vehicle entrance/exit 12, it approaches the vehicle position line K.
By using the above two types of lines I and J, the driver only needs to drive to the position displayed on the display unit 201b, and there is no need to assign a separate person to indicate the stopping position De, which reduces manpower. In the figure, the left end shows that the recognition mark H has not yet entered the target left and right lines I, I, as shown by "left and right x", and the right end shows that the truck 1 needs to move 20 m horizontally to the vehicle entrance/exit 12, as shown by "forward and backward 20 m".

When moving to the adjustment sub-step, even if the identifier read by the object detection unit 223 is not the distant identifier M1, but the truck 1 has already approached the vehicle entrance/exit 12 significantly and the optical axis of the cameras 437a, 437b has changed to the approaching identifier M2 diagonally above, the control performed by the object detection unit 223, the judgment processing unit 224, and the equipment control unit 226 is the same as that in the case of the distant identifier M1 (S48b to S48e). Note that if the memory unit 225 fails and cannot detect a suitable identifier, an error is displayed on the display unit 201b (S48e).

9, in the display adjustment steps (S5 to S10) following the search and display step (S4), display adjustment is performed in the case where the aircraft entrance 12 is no longer included in the camera images of the first camera 437a and the second camera 437b as the truck 1 approaches the aircraft entrance 12, which is provided at a high position on the curved aircraft surface of the airplane 11. However, this display adjustment transitions to stopping judgment control (S10) when the equipment control unit 226 receives a judgment from the judgment processing unit 224 that it cannot recognize the aircraft entrance 12.
When the equipment control unit 226 receives a judgment from the judgment processing unit 224 that the aircraft entrance/exit 12 has been recognized (S5), it judges based on the output data from the processing unit 224 whether the vertical position of the aircraft entrance/exit 12 in the camera images from the first camera 437a and the second camera 437b is inappropriate.

When the cargo bed 4 is in the stored state, the height positions of the first camera 437a and the second camera 437b are lower than the height position of the aircraft entrance/exit 12 of the airplane 11, and if the cameras 437a, 437b approach the airplane 11 while keeping their optical axes pointed horizontally, at least a part of the aircraft entrance/exit 12 will be above the camera images of the cameras 437a, 437b, making it difficult to accurately recognize the aircraft entrance/exit 12 or a recognition error will occur.
Therefore, the mounting object control unit 226 judges whether the upper end of the vehicle entrance 12 is in contact with the upper end of the camera image in the camera image of the cameras 437a, 437b with the optical axis oriented horizontally, and judges that the state is inappropriate if the upper end of the camera image is in contact (S6). If the mounting object control unit 226 judges that the state is inappropriate, the mounting object control unit 226 outputs a signal to the camera rotation motor 438 to rotate the cameras 437a, 437b upward by a predetermined angle, so that the vehicle entrance 12 can be accurately recognized (for example, the state shown in FIG. 11).
In addition, when the equipment control unit 226 determines that the vertical position of the aircraft entrance/exit 12 is appropriate in the camera images of the cameras 437a and 437b, it does not change the optical axes of the cameras 437a and 437b.

Next, in the area of the aircraft entrance/exit 12 where the recognition mark H is displayed in the camera images of the cameras 437a and 437b, the judgment processing unit 224 judges (S8) whether the output value output by the distant classifier M1 of the object detection unit 223 is less than a third threshold value (>first threshold value) and outputs this to the equipment control unit 226. If this output value is less than the third threshold value, the equipment control unit 226 switches the classifier read by the object detection unit 223 to the approach classifier M2 (S9). Note that if the approach classifier M2 was selected in the search and display step (S4), the judgment in step S8 is not performed.

The shape of the aircraft entrance 12 provided on the curved surface of the aircraft is significantly different when viewed from the front at a distance from that when viewed diagonally from below. When viewed diagonally from below, the shape of the aircraft entrance 12 is more distorted than the shape of the aircraft entrance 12 viewed from the front at a distance, as shown in FIG. 12, for example. Therefore, if the aircraft entrance 12 is recognized using the identifier (far-field identifier M1) used when viewed from a distance, there is a risk of a recognition error occurring while the truck 1 is moving. However, accurate recognition can be continued by controlling the switch from the far-field identifier M1 to the close-field identifier M2 as described above. Note that the switch from the far-field identifier M1 to the close-field identifier M2 is performed based on a third threshold value at which the output value of the object detection unit 223 using the far-field identifier M1 becomes low and the aircraft entrance 12 is becoming difficult to clearly recognize. If the output value output by the identifier M1 (or identifier M2) of the object detection unit 223 is equal to or higher than the third threshold value, the identifier is not switched.

While the worker drives the truck 1 using an appropriate identifier, the equipment control unit 226 judges whether the truck 1 has stopped at a suitable position (S10) based on the position information of the truck 1 from the position information acquisition unit 229, with the conditions that the truck 1 has not moved for a predetermined time (about several tens of seconds) and that the truck 1 is near a desired stopping position De based on the vehicle information. If it is judged that the truck 1 has "stopped," the operation proceeds from the third operation state to the loading platform raising step (S11 to S15) of the fourth operation state.
In this step, the equipment control unit 226 determines that the PTO 212 is on via the chassis control unit 227 (S11), and instructs the judgment processing unit 224 to switch the camera to be used from the first camera 437a and the second camera 437b to the third camera 439, causes the display unit 201b to display the image acquired by the third camera 439 (S12), and issues an instruction to switch the classifier to be used from the approach classifier M2 to the horizontal classifier M3 (S13).

Next, the loading platform 4 is raised based on a signal from the equipment operation unit 30. At this time, the display unit 201b displays an ascent judgment line N extending left and right as shown in FIG. 13. This ascent judgment line N is always displayed on the camera image of the third camera 439 regardless of whether the vehicle entrance/exit 12 is recognized or not, and the relative positions in the height direction of the tunnel section 430 to which the third camera 439 is attached and the PF 44 do not change even when each actuator is driven, so the vertical position of the ascent judgment line is set not to change.

The ascent judgment line N is a mark that allows the gang plate 456 to be spanned across the inner floor surface of the aircraft entrance/exit 12 at a reasonable rotation angle (a rotation angle at which a worker can easily push the in-flight meal cart on the gang plate 456) when the loading platform 4 is stopped at a point where the upper and lower height positions in the camera image of the third camera 439 match with the lower end of the aircraft entrance/exit 12.
The ascent determination line N is drawn at a position in the camera image of the third camera 439 where the tip of PF 44 will reach when the tip of PF 44 is extended from the stopping position De of the truck 1 to a distance that allows the bridge plate 456 to be spanned. Since the farther the distance from the camera is in the camera image, the closer to the center of the image it is displayed, the higher the position of the tip of PF 44 is, so the ascent determination line N is displayed slightly above the position of the tip of PF 44 before extension.

Incidentally, immediately after the loading platform 4 starts to rise, the third camera 439 is located at a height position lower than the aircraft entrance/exit 12 and its optical axis is oriented horizontally, so the camera image does not include the aircraft entrance/exit 12 at all. However, as the loading platform 4 rises, the camera image begins to include the lower part of the aircraft entrance/exit 12.

The display of the above-mentioned rise determination line N and the control of the lifting operation of the platform 4 (S14) will be described with reference to FIG.
When the system transitions to the fourth work state and switches to the third camera 439 (S12), the ascent determination line N is displayed (S141), and image data acquired by the third camera 439 is input to the object detection unit 223 (S142).
The object detection unit 223 raster scans the detection window in the camera image, calculates the HOG feature amount in each detection window area (S143), and sends the recognition result (positive value or negative value) in each area in the object detection unit 223 to the judgment processing unit 224 based on each HOG feature amount input to the horizontal classifier M3. The judgment processing unit 224 searches and extracts an area whose output value is positive and equal to or greater than the fourth threshold (S144). Furthermore, by finding an area equal to or greater than the fourth threshold (S145), the equipment control unit 226 displays a recognition mark P surrounding the area judged to be equal to or greater than the fourth threshold (area recognized as the aircraft entrance/exit 12) on the display unit 201b (S147a).

During the continued lifting of the platform 4, the equipment control unit 226 judges whether the bottom end of the vehicle entrance 12 overlaps the lifting judgment line N (S147b), and when the platform 4 is lifted to a position where the bottom end of the vehicle entrance 12 overlaps the lifting judgment line N, the height of the platform 4 becomes a height at which it can be connected to the vehicle entrance 12. At this time, the equipment control unit 226 stops the lifting of the platform 4 and generates a sound from the speaker 201a to notify the completion of the lifting (S147c). Note that, as shown in FIG. 15, if the lifting judgment line N is below the bottom end of the vehicle entrance 12 even though the vehicle entrance 12 is recognized, this is the case when the platform 4 has not yet been lifted to a position at which it can be connected to the vehicle entrance 12, and the lifting cylinder 302 is extended by a predetermined stroke to lift the platform 4 by a predetermined height.

Since the platform lifting step starts immediately after the platform 4 is lifted, the camera image does not include the vehicle entrance 12 at all or includes a partially missing vehicle entrance 12 at the beginning, making it difficult to recognize the vehicle entrance 12 (S145). The equipment control unit 226 calculates the difference between the height position h1 of the lifting/lowering PF 44 and the height position h2 of the vehicle entrance 12 based on the vehicle information (S146a), and judges whether the calculation result h1-h2 is negative or not (S146b). Here, the height position h1 of the PF 44 can be detected based on the stroke of the lifting/lowering cylinder 302.
At this time, since h1-h2 is negative while the vehicle entrance 12 is not included in the camera image (until the loading platform 4 is raised to a certain extent), the equipment control unit 226 displays "not recognized" on the display unit 201b (S146c). The "not recognized" display notifies the user that the vehicle entrance 12 is being recognized but the loading platform 4 has not been raised sufficiently.
After the unrecognized display, the equipment control unit 226 extends the lifting cylinder 302 by a predetermined stroke to raise the loading platform 4 by a predetermined height (S146d), and repeats the loading platform raising step.

By repeating the above-mentioned bed lifting step, most of the aircraft entrance 12 is included in the camera image as shown in FIG. 13, and the judgment processing unit 224 extracts the aircraft entrance 12 as an area equal to or greater than the fourth threshold, and sends the judgment result that the aircraft entrance 12 has been recognized to the equipment control unit 226 (S145). On the other hand, even if the bed 4 has risen to a height where it can be connected to the aircraft entrance 12, the aircraft entrance 12 may not be recognized (S145), and h1-h2 may become a positive value, causing the equipment control unit 226 to make an emergency stop on the lift of the bed 4 and display an error on the display unit 201b (S146e). By making an emergency stop on the lift of the bed 4, it is possible to prevent the bed 4 from colliding with the wing of the airplane 11. In addition, the error display can prompt the worker to check the equipment of the truck 1.

When the lifting of the loading platform 4 is completed as described above, in order to continue the automatic control as shown in FIG. 8, the equipment control unit 226 checks whether the vehicle entrance/exit 12 is recognized (S15), and if it is recognized, the left/right adjustment steps (S16 to S19) and the front/rear adjustment steps (S20 to S23) are performed, whereas if it is not recognized, the autonomous control by the equipment control unit 226 is stopped and the operator manually operates the horizontal movement mechanism using the equipment operation unit 230.

In the left-right adjustment step, first, the equipment control unit 226 determines whether the gangway plate 456 is misaligned left or right with respect to the aircraft entrance/exit 12 (S16). During the movement of the truck 1 from the in-flight food factory 10 to the stopping position De in the airport, the base unit 43 is stopped in the left-right center and the PF 44 is stopped in the left-right center. Therefore, if the truck 1 can stop without misalignment in the left-right direction with respect to the aircraft entrance/exit 12 (S16), the aircraft entrance/exit 12 will be located in the left-right center of the image of the third camera 439, and the left-right center position of the image of the third camera 439 will match the left-right center position of the recognition mark P, so the base unit 43 will not slide and the first PF 450 and second PF 451 will not rotate. However, when the truck 1 stops at the stopping position De, if the vehicle entrance/exit 12 is shifted to the left or right from the left-right center of the image of the third camera 439 (S16), the equipment control unit 226 calculates the amount of deviation between the left-right center position of the image of the third camera 439 and the left-right center position of the recognition mark P. At this time, if the equipment control unit 226 determines that there is a deviation that exceeds the allowable range, it determines whether the amount of deviation exceeds the left-right movement limit of the base unit 43 (S17).

When the equipment control unit 226 determines that the left-right movement limit of the base unit 43 has been exceeded, the first PF 450 and the second PF 451 are rotated by a predetermined angle each time until the left-right center positions of the PF 44 and the bridge plate 456 are aligned with the left-right center position of the recognition mark P (S18). Specifically, the equipment control unit 226 rotates the first PF 450 and the second PF 451 by a predetermined angle so that the leading edge of the second PF 451 is approximately parallel to the lower edge of the aircraft entrance/exit 12 and so that the left-right position of the second PF 451 approaches the aircraft entrance/exit 12.

On the other hand, if the equipment control unit 226 does not determine that the amount of deviation exceeds the left-right movement limit of the base unit 43, the base unit 43 is moved left and right by a predetermined distance at a time using the slide mechanism 432 up to its left-right movement limit so that the left-right center of the recognition mark P coincides with the left-right center positions of the PF 44 and the cross plate 456 (S19).
If it is determined that the amount of misalignment of the bridge plate 456 is within an allowable range due to the sliding movement of the base portion 43 and the pivoting movement of the first PF 450 and the second PF 451 (S16), the process proceeds to the front-rear adjustment steps (S20 to S23).

In this step, the equipment control unit 226 determines whether the distance from the tip of the second PF 451 to the aircraft entrance/exit 12 is less than the connectable distance L2 based on the distance data sent from the first distance sensor 459 and the second distance sensor 459b.
If the connectable distance is equal to or greater than L2 (NO in S20), the equipment control unit 226 extends one or both of the slide cylinders 412, 443 to move the tip of the second PF 451 forward a predetermined distance (in the direction indicated by arrow E4 or arrow E5 in Figure 3) (S21).

If the operation of step S21 is repeated and it is determined in step S20 that the distance is less than the connectable distance L2, the equipment control unit 226 rotates the upright bridge plate 456 downward toward the vehicle entrance 12 to connect (S22). In addition, the equipment control unit 226 stops the rotation of the bridge plate 456 when the bridge plate 456 touches the floor surface of the vehicle entrance 12 and a ground contact signal is sent from the ground contact sensor 460.
The driving of the gangway plate rotating motor 458 may be stopped with a predetermined delay from the timing when the ground contact signal is sent. In this way, since the portion of the second disk 457e that engages with the engaging protrusion 457f is the engaging long hole 457g, when the airplane 11 sinks due to the loading of fuel or the like, the gangway plate 456 can be tilted slightly without moving the gangway plate rotating motor 458 so as to follow the sinking.

After the gangway plate 456 is placed on the floor of the aircraft entrance/exit 12, the equipment control unit 226 drives the shutter opening/closing motor 414 to open the shutter 413 (S23). This allows movement between the baggage loading section 41 and the interior of the airplane 11 via the PF 44 and the gangway plate 456, and allows loading and unloading of in-flight meal carts.

The object recognition unit 221 continues to recognize the vehicle entrance 12 even after the bridge plate 456 is connected to the vehicle entrance 12, and the equipment control unit 226 judges whether the lower end of the vehicle entrance 12 overlaps with the ascent judgment line N. If the lower end of the vehicle entrance 12 falls below the ascent judgment line N, the equipment control unit 226 switches the control valve 215 with the hydraulic pump 213 stopped, and discharges hydraulic oil from the lift cylinder 302 to the hydraulic oil tank 214. At this time, by stopping the discharge of hydraulic oil at the timing when the lower end of the vehicle entrance 12 overlaps with the ascent judgment line N, the loading platform 4 can be lowered to the height position of the vehicle entrance 12.

The above control allows the loading platform 4 to be connected to the airplane (luggage loading/unloading section) 11 simply, accurately, and quickly. In addition, since the connection control is performed based on the height position of the aircraft entrance/exit 12 while image recognition is performed, the bridge plate 456 can also be in a substantially horizontal state, which is also suitable for loading and unloading in-flight meal carts. In addition, the above-mentioned first camera 437a and second camera 43 used for image recognition preferably detect objects that may come into contact with the truck 1 based on the distance image generated by the distance image generation unit 222 while the truck 1 moves from the waiting position W to the stopping position De. For example, the possibility of contact can be determined based on the size of the recognized object and the distance to the object. If it is determined that such an object is present, a warning sound is emitted from the speaker 201a, or a warning display that surrounds the object is displayed on the display unit 201b.

In this embodiment, the electric actuators include a camera rotation motor 438, a shutter opening/closing motor 414, a bridge plate rotation motor 458, or a slide motor 433. The hydraulic actuators include a first slide cylinder 412 that slides the luggage carrier 41 in the fore-aft direction of the chassis, a second slide cylinder 443 that slides the intermediate PF 441 back and forth, a first swivel motor 444 that swivels the first PF 450 of the tip PF 442 left and right, a second swivel motor 452 that swivels the second PF 451 left and right, and a lifting cylinder 302 that lifts and lowers the platform 4. However, these are not limited to being electric or hydraulic, and can be changed as appropriate.

The number and movement of the components of the platform (PF) 44 can be changed as appropriate. For example, the platform can be divided into two parts, a base end PF and a tip end PF, or the tip end PF can be configured to move only back and forth without rotating.

In this embodiment, the first camera 437a and the second camera 437b are provided on the PF 44 of the connection exchange unit 42, and the third camera 439 is provided on the base unit 43 of the connection exchange unit 42, but the number and mounting locations of the cameras are not limited to this. For example, cameras may be provided on both the connection exchange unit and the baggage vehicle unit, or only on the baggage vehicle unit.
In addition, the luggage carrying section 41 is moved in the fore-and-aft direction relative to the chassis 2 by the extension and retraction of the first slide cylinder 412, and the connection switching section 42 is moved in the left-right direction relative to the chassis 2 by the slide mechanism 432, but the present invention is not limited to this, and it is also possible for only one of the luggage carrying section and the connection switching section to be moved relative to the chassis.

In terms of control, in this embodiment, the work on the truck 1 consists of four work states, the first work state to the fourth work state, and in the third work state, the equipment control unit 226 uses the output data of the first camera 437a and the second camera 437b to display stopping guide information such as target left and right lines I, I on the display unit 201b. In the fourth work state, the equipment control unit 226 uses the output data of the third camera 439 to automatically stop the lifting of the loading platform 4 at a height that can be connected to the vehicle entrance/exit 12. The present invention is not limited to this, and the equipment control unit may only automatically stop the loading platform when it is lifted after stopping, without displaying the stopping guide. In addition, the order of the loading platform lifting steps (S11 to S15), the left and right adjustment steps (S16 to S19), and the front and rear adjustment steps (S20 to S23) in the fourth work state can also be changed as appropriate.

In this embodiment, the first camera 437a and the second camera 437b serving as the object image acquisition unit are configured as stereo cameras, but the object image acquisition unit may be configured with other devices capable of detecting the three-dimensional shape of an object and the distance to the object. For example, a 3D-LIDAR or a distance image sensor may be used as the object image acquisition unit.

In this embodiment, a chassis 2 is used in which an operator drives the truck 1 to a predetermined stopping position De for the airplane 11 and stops the truck 1 there, but the present invention is not limited to this, and an autonomously driven chassis may also be used.

In this embodiment, the chassis 2 of the truck 1 is equipped with an engine 210, a transmission 211, and a PTO 212 attached to the transmission 211, and is configured to switch the PTO 212 (outputting driving force to the running tires 202 or the hydraulic pump 213) using a PTO switch 231 as a power changeover switch. The present invention is not limited to this, and can also be applied to work vehicles that run on a running electric motor instead of an engine and drive the hydraulic pump with an electric motor dedicated to the mounted equipment, and that do not have a PTO. In this case, the power changeover switch corresponds to the main power switch for driving the mounted equipment.

In this embodiment, the high lift truck 1 is used to transport in-flight meal carts, but the present invention is not limited to this and can also be applied to high lift trucks for transporting in-flight items such as magazines and headphones, and high lift trucks for carrying disabled people in wheelchairs or stretchers onto an airplane.
In addition, in this embodiment, an aviation high lift truck has been described as an example of a work vehicle to which the present invention can be applied, but the present invention is not limited to this and can be applied to various work vehicles.

For example, there are many types of work vehicles in airports, including not only high-lift trucks that transport in-flight meal carts, but also fuel tankers, lavatory vehicles, trash cars, de-icing cars, etc. Among such work vehicles in airports, the present invention can be applied to those that require accurate alignment with airplanes.
Specifically, for example, in a fuel tanker as shown in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2003-154886, a lift mechanism is provided at the rear of the vehicle, and this lift mechanism is used to raise and lower a lifter serving as a work platform. In addition, a nozzle at the tip of a fuel supply hose is disposed on the lifter. Such a fuel tanker is stopped after aligning the lifter so that it is below the fuel supply port on the underside of the wing of an airplane. Then, an operator manually raises the lifter and manually aligns the tip nozzle of the fuel supply hose with the fuel supply port, and then connects the hose to the fuel supply port, thereby refueling the airplane with the fuel stored in the on-board tank. For example, the on-board tank of such a fuel tanker is considered to be the baggage on-board unit of the present invention, and the lift mechanism is considered to be the connection and replacement unit of the present invention. Then, when it is desired to automatically raise the lifter and automatically align the tip nozzle of the fuel supply hose with the fuel supply port, the present invention can be applied by photographing the fuel supply port with a camera as an object image acquisition unit, and controlling the lifting of the lift mechanism with a control unit based on the output data.

Furthermore, for example, a lavatory vehicle as shown in JP 2012-1104 A has a tank for loading toilet wastewater from an airplane, and the rear of the vehicle is equipped with a work platform and a lifting device for raising and lowering the work platform. Such a lavatory vehicle is parked after aligning the work platform so that it is below the wastewater outlet of the airplane. Then, an operator climbs onto the work platform and manually raises the work platform while connecting the tip of the hose to the wastewater outlet of the airplane. The on-board tank of this lavatory vehicle is considered to be the luggage vehicle loading section of the present invention, and the lifting device is considered to be the connection switching section of the present invention. Then, when it is desired to automatically raise the work platform and automatically align the tip of the hose with the wastewater outlet, the present invention can be applied by photographing the wastewater outlet with a camera as an object image acquisition section, and controlling the rise of the lifting device with a control section based on the output data.

The present invention is applicable not only to airport work vehicles such as the above-mentioned fuel tanker and lavatory vehicle, but also to various work vehicles that transport waste, parcels, mail, etc.
For example, a garbage truck as shown in JP 61-124402 A includes a garbage container for containing waste, a movable arm provided on the side of the vehicle, and a gripping device attached to the tip of the movable arm for gripping the garbage container. When the garbage truck is stopped, the worker adjusts the front-rear position of the vehicle so that the gripping device is near the location where the garbage container is placed. After stopping, the worker manually operates the movable arm to move the gripping device to the side of the vehicle to align it with the garbage container and have the gripping device grip the garbage container. Furthermore, the worker operates the movable arm to throw the waste in the garbage container into the garbage container. In the case of such a garbage truck, the garbage container is considered to be the luggage vehicle loading section of the present invention, the movable arm is considered to be the connection and switching section of the present invention, and the garbage container is considered to be the luggage carrying-in/out section. The present invention can be applied by photographing the waste container with a camera serving as an object image acquisition unit, and controlling the movement of the movable arm with a control unit based on the output data.

Also, for example, a mobile body for home delivery, such as that shown in JP 2018-177439 A, can move autonomously with luggage stored in the internal space area. This mobile body also includes an extended rail section such as a belt conveyor installed in the delivery box section, and a storage mechanism that stores luggage that has been moved to the mobile body side via the extended rail section in the internal space area. This mobile body moves to the delivery box at the delivery destination and stops. After stopping, the extended rail section is aligned with the opening and closing door of a specific locker section among multiple locker sections provided in the delivery box. In the case of such a mobile body, the internal space area is considered to be the luggage vehicle mounting section of the present invention, the extended rail section is considered to be the connection and switching section of the present invention, and the locker section is considered to be the luggage loading and unloading section. The present invention can be applied by photographing the opening and closing door of the locker section with a camera as an object image acquisition section, and controlling the movement of the extended rail section with a control section based on the output data.

-Other embodiments-
The embodiments disclosed herein are illustrative in all respects and are not intended to be limiting. The technical scope of the present invention is not interpreted solely by the above-described embodiments, but is defined by the claims. The technical scope of the present invention includes all modifications within the scope and meaning equivalent to the claims.

1. Truck (work vehicle)
2 Chassis 3 Lifting mechanism 4 Loading platform 11 Airplane (luggage loading/unloading area)
12. Aircraft entrance/exit (entrance/exit for baggage handling area)
15 Control Tower (Management Center)
41 Luggage carrying section 42 Connection/switching section 43 Base section 44 Platform (PF)
201a Display unit 213 Hydraulic pump 214 Hydraulic oil tank 215 Hydraulic control valve 220 Control unit 221 Object recognition unit 222 Distance image generation unit 223 Object detection unit 224 Judgment processing unit 225 Memory unit 226 Mounted object control unit 228 Communication unit 229 Position information acquisition unit 231 PTO switch (power changeover switch)
412 First slide cylinder (driving actuator)
432 Slide mechanism 443 Second slide cylinder (driving actuator)
437a First camera (object image acquisition unit)
437b Second camera (object image acquisition unit)
439 Third camera (object image acquisition unit)
444 First turning motor (drive actuator)
452 Second rotation motor (drive actuator)
456 Gang plate 458 Gang plate rotation motor De Stop position H Recognition mark P Recognition mark I Target left and right lines (stop guide information)
J Lines before and after the target (stop guide information)
K Vehicle position line (stop guide information)
M1 Distant discriminator (discriminator)
M2 Approach discriminator (first discriminator)
M3 horizontal discriminator (second discriminator)
N Rising judgment line

Claims (6)

a loading platform that is movable between a lowered state in which the loading platform is lowered horizontally relative to the vehicle chassis and a raised state in which the loading platform is raised while remaining in the horizontal state;
A connection and switching unit is mounted on the loading platform and connected to an aircraft entrance and exit;
an object image acquisition unit mounted on the platform to acquire data of an object image;
a control unit that controls the height of the loading platform based on the image acquired by the object image acquisition unit regarding the vehicle body entrance/exit;
The control unit includes a distance determination unit that determines whether the vehicle has approached the aircraft entrance to a predetermined distance, and a proximity identifier that detects the aircraft entrance based on the acquired result when the distance determination unit determines the approach,
When driving towards the plane,
The loading platform is in the lowered state up to below the aircraft entrance , and a stopping position below the aircraft entrance is set based on the detection of the aircraft entrance by the approach identifier.
A work vehicle characterized by: The work vehicle according to claim 1 , wherein the control unit detects the vehicle entrance/exit based on the result of acquisition by the object image acquisition unit, and controls the height of the loading platform in accordance with the detected vehicle entrance/exit. 3. The work vehicle according to claim 1, wherein the control unit controls the height of the loading platform using a height position of an aircraft entrance/exit as aircraft information of the airplane. A control device that controls a work vehicle for performing work on an airplane, the work vehicle having a connection switching unit on a platform that can be raised and lowered between a lowered state in which the platform is lowered horizontally relative to the platform and a raised state in which the platform is raised while remaining horizontal, so that the work vehicle can automatically travel within an airport and reach the airplane,
a distance determination unit that determines whether the vehicle has approached a predetermined distance to an entrance/exit point of the aircraft, and an approach identifier that detects the entrance/exit point of the aircraft based on point cloud data acquired by an object image acquisition unit mounted on the loading platform when the distance determination unit determines that the vehicle has approached the entrance/exit point of the aircraft,
A control device characterized by placing the loading platform in the lowered state, detecting the position of the vehicle body entrance/exit using the approach identifier, and controlling the work vehicle's travel to a stopping position below the vehicle body entrance/exit using the detected position of the vehicle body entrance/exit. A control device that controls a work vehicle for performing work on an airplane, the work vehicle having a connection switching unit on a platform that can be raised and lowered between a lowered state in which the platform is lowered horizontally relative to the platform and a raised state in which the platform is raised while remaining horizontal, so that the work vehicle can automatically travel within an airport and reach the airplane,
a distance determination unit that determines whether the vehicle has approached a predetermined distance to an entrance/exit point of the aircraft, and a proximity identifier that detects the entrance/exit point of the aircraft based on image data acquired by an object image acquisition unit mounted on the loading platform when the distance determination unit determines that the vehicle has approached the entrance/exit point of the aircraft,
A control device characterized by placing the loading platform in the lowered state, detecting the position of the vehicle body entrance/exit using the approach identifier, and controlling the work vehicle's travel to a stopping position below the vehicle body entrance/exit using the detected position of the vehicle body entrance/exit. a connection switching unit that is provided so as to be raised and lowered between a lowered state in which the vehicle is lowered in a horizontal state relative to the chassis and an elevated state in which the vehicle is elevated while remaining in the horizontal state, and that is connected to an entrance and exit of the aircraft body;
an object image acquisition unit for acquiring data of an object image;
a control unit that controls a height of the connection and replacement unit based on an acquisition result of the object image acquisition unit regarding the aircraft entrance/exit,
When driving towards the plane,
The connection exchange unit is in the descending state up to below the vehicle entrance , and the control unit detects the vehicle entrance based on the acquired result to set a stop position below the vehicle entrance, and displays a target line for traveling to the stop position on a display unit.
A work vehicle characterized by:

Images