Design and Development of a Small-Scale All-Terrain Ground Vehicle for Autonomous Operation

Miguel Pereira Francisco Pinho

Key information

Authors:

Miguel Pereira Francisco Pinho (Miguel Pereira Francisco Pinho)

Supervisors:

Artur Jorge Silva Coutinho Machado; Alexandra Bento Moutinho (Alexandra Moutinho)

Published in

July 2, 2025

Abstract

Mobile robots are an emerging technology with expanding applications across various fields, including defence. In response to this trend, the Portuguese Army has invested in initiatives like the EXE03 project. This thesis contributes to that effort by supporting the development of an Uncrewed Ground Vehicle (UGV). This vehicle, designed at scale, constitutes an experimental platform for the development and validation of solutions aimed at autonomous vehicles in real environments. The objectives of the project were defined based on functional requirements outlined by the European Defence Fund for military UGVs, focusing on teleoperation, waypoint navigation, and collision detection and avoidance. A functional differential drive robot was designed and built from the ground up, based on the Devastator platform and equipped with a sensor suite aligned with the defined objectives. A ROS2 based software framework was implemented and containerized with Docker to ensure reproducibility and scalability across different platforms. A collision avoidance algorithm was developed to assist teleoperation by applying corrective velocity commands, based on obstacle proximity. The UGV is SLAM capable through the integration of the SLAM Toolbox package. This functionality was validated in both indoor and outdoor environments, exhibiting accurate localization and mapping performance. A functional waypoint navigation solution was implemented, utilizing the Navigation 2 framework. Three different local planners were tested, in a challenging scenario, where waypoints were assigned randomly. A total of 60 waypoints were reached, demonstrating reliable autonomous navigation.