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Start with the material movement
Choose a vehicle around the job it must do: what it carries, where it picks up and sets down, how high it must lift, and what path it takes. Dematic’s application guide describes several common forms, from point-to-point transport to pallet handling and storage retrieval. These are useful starting points, not a complete market taxonomy.
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| Vehicle form | Typical job | What to verify at the site |
|---|---|---|
| Deck or unit-load transport | Moves a load between defined pickup and drop-off points. | Load dimensions, transfer height, handoff tolerances, and whether the load stays stable in transit. |
| Counterbalance pallet vehicle | Handles pallets with a counterbalanced lifting arrangement. | Rated load and load center, pallet compatibility, stability, floor condition, and pickup/drop geometry. |
| Reach vehicle | Places or retrieves loads at elevated storage locations. | Required lift height, rack and aisle clearances, load presentation, and placement accuracy. |
| Very-narrow-aisle vehicle | Works in aisles designed for constrained vehicle movement. | Aisle width, rack alignment, turning and recovery space, and how people and other vehicles are excluded or managed. |
| Tugger or towing vehicle | Pulls one or more carts or trailers along a route. | Train length, trailer coupling, turning radius, braking, and the effect of the train on crossings and pedestrian sightlines. |
| Custom vehicle | Moves unusual, oversized, or application-specific loads. | Load interface, center of gravity, travel envelope, handoff design, and validation of the configured vehicle and safety functions. |
Do not assume that an automated vehicle can take over every manual forklift task without changes to racks, floors, crossings, load presentation, or safety controls. Check the complete transfer—from the upstream process that presents the load to the downstream process that receives it. Dematic’s AGV application guide outlines examples of vehicle forms and uses.
Compare navigation by route-change needs, not by label
Guidance and localization determine how a vehicle follows a path, knows where it is, and reaches a transfer point. Options described in supplier materials include laser, magnetic, wire, camera, natural-target, and mapped navigation. They differ in infrastructure, installation effort, maintenance, and how readily routes can change. Dematic’s AGV software and battery brochure describes several guidance approaches.
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- DANGER – AUTONOMOUS ROBOTS OPERATING – Alerts employees and visitors that driverless robots may move without warning, reducing the risk of collisions in busy warehouse and manufacturing environments.
- CLEAR INSTRUCTIONS TO STAY BACK – “MAY MOVE WITHOUT WARNING – KEEP CLEAR OF WORK ZONE” makes expectations obvious and helps support your written SOPs and safety training.
- INDUSTRIAL-GRADE 8×12 IN .040 ALUMINUM – Rigid aluminum sign resists bending, rust, and fading so it can live on dock doors, aisle ends, robot charging zones, and control rooms.
- PRE-DRILLED FOR EASY INSTALLATION – Four mounting holes fit screws, bolts, or zip ties, giving you flexibility to mount on racks, guardrails, bollards, or walls.
- DESIGNED FOR MODERN ROBOTIC OPERATIONS – Ideal for warehouses using AMRs/AGVs, manufacturing cells with cobots, and logistics hubs where people and robots share space.
“AGV” and “AMR” are not reliable shorthand for a single fixed set of capabilities. OMRON contrasts mapped, infrastructure-free AMR navigation with AGVs that follow guides such as floor magnets or beacons, but that vendor comparison simplifies a diverse category. Its materials also describe systems that combine mapped movement with infrastructure-assisted positioning for precise pickup and drop-off. Verify the exact model and configuration instead of assuming that every AGV needs a fixed route or every AMR reroutes in every situation. See OMRON’s AGV/AMR navigation comparison and its Fleet Operations Workspace Core manual.
- If routes rarely change: Compare the cost and disruption of installing and maintaining guides against the value of repeatable movement.
- If routes or floor conditions change: Ask how the selected system localizes, how obstacles affect movement, and what work is needed to update paths or references.
- If docking must be precise: Test pickup and drop-off accuracy with the actual pallets, carts, stations, and load presentation—not just a demonstration target.
- If aisles are constrained: Confirm turning, passing, stopping, and safe recovery space for the vehicle and its load.
Assess safety for the whole operating zone
ISO 3691-4:2023 is the currently listed published edition for safety requirements and verification for driverless industrial trucks and their systems, including AGVs and AMRs. ISO identifies it as Edition 2, published in June 2023, and states that the operating zone significantly affects safe operation. The standard addresses hazards over the truck lifecycle; its public abstract also lists exclusions and limits. Read the applicable standard and local requirements for a project rather than treating its public summary as a complete compliance checklist. See ISO 3691-4:2023.
ISO also lists ISO/DIS 3691-4 as a draft in the enquiry phase that is intended to replace the 2023 edition. The draft preview includes topics such as movement-stop and holding functions, safeguarding, operating modes, communication loss, and verification. Those are draft topics, not requirements to attribute to the published 2023 edition. Check the standard’s status again when defining project requirements. The draft preview provides further detail.
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For example, Dematic describes safety-rated laser scanners with warning and protective fields, speed reduction, stopping, emergency-stop buttons, and visual or audible warnings. These are vendor-described features, not independent proof of compliance for a particular vehicle or site. Ask for the safety functions on the exact configuration, field settings, integration and validation documents, and the process for verifying performance in the operating zone. See Dematic’s discussion of AGV safety features.
Make recovery a demonstrable operating workflow
A vehicle that stops is an operational event. Before a purchase, walk through what happens when it encounters an obstruction, loses localization, develops a fault, or blocks a shared route. The goal is not merely to see that an operator can restart it; it is to understand how the cause is identified and resolved without creating a larger traffic or safety problem.
- Detect: What status or alert tells the operator that a vehicle has stopped, and where can they see it?
- Diagnose: Can the operator distinguish an obstruction, localization issue, equipment fault, or communications problem?
- Respond safely: What procedure clears an obstruction or calls maintenance, and which manual or recovery modes are available?
- Restore: How is the vehicle relocalized, released, and returned to service after the cause is addressed?
- Manage the disruption: Can dispatch reroute or reprioritize work, and what happens to other vehicles if the stopped vehicle occupies a critical passage?
OMRON’s manual documents a touchscreen for checking status, sending goals, pausing or releasing vehicles, and localizing a lost AMR, as well as an operator pendant. Those are examples to test in a demonstration, not features to assume are present or behave identically across hardware and configurations. Ask the supplier to demonstrate the recovery process using the intended fleet setup and operating roles. See the OMRON Fleet Operations Workspace Core manual.
Evaluate fleet control and system integration
Fleet performance depends on dispatch and traffic management as well as individual vehicle capability. Dematic describes software that assigns transport orders, selects routes, tracks vehicles, and manages traffic. OMRON Digital describes a warehouse control system (WCS) that can coordinate vehicles from different manufacturers and handle transport instructions from an external system. These are supplier descriptions; verify the interfaces and behavior needed for your operation. See Dematic’s software brochure and OMRON Digital’s WCS description.
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- 【What You Get】You will get 4pcs 97mm mecanum omni-directional wheels, 4pcs 6mm metal couplings for DC motor connection with screws. One can DIY immediately the mecanum wheeled car using the metal panel for robot learning.
- 【Robotics Learning】Mecanum is very popular. One can DIY smart RoS robot based on the mecanum wheels. By using SLAM algorithms, one can realize the functions of warehouse handling robot. Schools can use these wheeled robots for competition and teaching.
- 【AGV Robot】AGV robot is used in the warehouse. Use the mecanum omni directional wheels, electronics development board controller, and SLAM algorithms. One can realize the AGV robot carrying items functions.
- 【Code Programming】Based on the mecanum wheeled robot car chassis, one can use the Arduino uno R3, raspberry pie, or other main board controller to control the robot by code programming. Can learn the different algorithms, embedded knowledge code programming.
- 【Maker Education】One can learn the robotic structure, to design the robotics platform, and assemble the robotics. Smart AI RoS robot learning is helpful for people, especially for students, makers, hobbyists and teachers. This mecanum wheel set is a research and learning kit for adult college students.
Ask vendors and integrators to show how the proposed system handles routine orders and exceptions, not just a standard route. Clarify:
- Which warehouse, production, or enterprise systems send transport instructions, and which interfaces are supported?
- How are priorities, blocked routes, failed handoffs, and unavailable vehicles handled?
- Who owns and maintains location, destination, load, and other master data?
- Has the proposed combination of vehicles and software been validated in a mixed-fleet use case?
- What alert history, logs, spare-parts coverage, and service response are available for the site?
Match charging to the shift pattern
Charging affects labor, vehicle availability, and continuity. Dematic lists manual battery exchange, automatic exchange, and automatic opportunity recharging. The right choice depends on local constraints; no single approach is best for every operation. Compare the options against shift length and breaks, charging windows, battery-handling labor, charger locations, fleet redundancy, and the operational effect of an unavailable charging point. See Dematic’s AGV battery-system information.
Use a site-based comparison before selecting a design
There is no supported universal ranking of AGV designs by safety, recovery time, throughput, or total cost in the cited material. Vendor features and performance claims are useful inputs, but site results depend on the vehicle configuration, layout, workload, and operating procedures. Compare candidates using the same measures and require a pilot or acceptance test where performance depends on facility conditions.
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- Payload, load center, load interface, lift or tow geometry, and transfer tolerances.
- Path and aisle constraints, guidance infrastructure, localization references, and effort required to change routes.
- Obstacle response, protective functions, operating modes, and evidence that the integrated installation has been validated.
- Docking accuracy and performance with the actual load, rack, station, and floor conditions.
- Fleet dispatch, traffic handling, supported interfaces, and exception behavior.
- Fault diagnosis, relocalization, return-to-service steps, service coverage, and impact of a blocked route.
- Charging approach, shift availability, labor requirements, and the effect of charger or vehicle downtime.
- Implementation effort and lifecycle costs, including site changes, software integration, service, and operations.
OMRON’s brochure reports “up to 15%” cycle-time improvement for actual fleets. That is a vendor-reported maximum, not an independent benchmark or a generally expected result; the retrieved brochure text does not establish a publication year. Treat it as a claim to validate against your own baseline and acceptance criteria, not as a forecast. See OMRON’s Fleet Operations Workspace Core brochure.
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