Household robot and method for operating a household robot
AssigneeVorwerk & Co. Interholding GmbH
InventorMarkus Cornelissen
Life of this patent
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Abstract
The invention relates to a household robot, in particular an automatically movable cleaning robot for a floor area, having a housing, having running gear which is arranged on the underside of the housing, having a sensor system for detecting the area surrounding the housing and having a control for automatically controlling the running gear, in which the technical problem of preventing soiling by excrement from a living being is solved by providing detection element for detecting a sub-area of the floor area which has been soiled by excrement from a living being and by the control element changing the operating mode of the household robot dependent on an output signal from the detection element. The invention also relates to a method for operating a household robot.
Claims10
A household robot comprising:
- a housing,
- a running gear which is arranged on the underside of the housing,
- a sensor system for detecting the area surrounding the housing, and
- a control means for automatically controlling the running gear,
- wherein detection means for detecting a sub-area of the floor area which has been soiled by excrement from a living being are provided, and wherein the detection means comprise at least one gas sensor for detecting at least one specific gas concentration,
- wherein evaluation means for evaluating the specific gas concentration are provided,
- wherein the control means change the operating mode of the household robot in dependency of an output signal from the detection means, and
- wherein the control means control the running gear in order to at least partly prevent the soiled sub-area from being driven over or cleaned if the specific gas concentration exceeds a predefined limit.
A method for operating a household robot having a cleaning mechanism, a gas sensor, a control means, evaluation means for evaluating a specific gas concentration, and a running gear, the method comprising the steps of:
- detecting, with the gas sensor, for the presence of excrement from a living being on a floor area to be cleaned,
- evaluating, with the evaluating means, the specific gas concentration;
- determining, with the control means, whether the specific gas concentration exceeds a predefined limit;
- changing a setting of a function of the household robot, with the control means, when the specific gas concentration exceeds the predefined limit, and
- changing a setting of the running gear, with the control means, in such a way, that at least partly, a soiled sub-area is prevented from being driven over.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.