Floor cleaning robot and method of controlling same

A method of controlling a robot for cleaning a floor of a railroad vehicle wile automatically traveling over the floor, the vehicle having seats and entrance-exit doors along both side walls of the vehicle, the robot having a robot body and comprising a travel mechanism controllable for locomotion in a desired direction, distance detecting means arranged as directed at least toward the front and opposite sides of the robot body for measuring the distance to the seat or the wall, map storing means having stored therein a cleaning region of the floor as a two-dimensional map, and path storing means having stored therein a predetermined path of travel for cleaning the floor as expressed in coordinates on the two-dimensional map, the method comprising:

• the first step of causing the robot body as placed in the interior of the vehicle to travel to an end portion of the vehicle along the direction of advance of the vehicle,
• the second step of recognizing at the vehicle end portion the coordinates of the position of the robot body on the map based on outputs from the distance detecting means,
• the third step of setting the recognized coordinate position as a reference point of automatic travel of the robot body on the map, and
• the fourth step of correcting the course of the robot body automatically traveling along the predetermined path based on outputs from the distance detecting means so that the robot body travels the predetermined path.