Clarifying Ideas on Fuzzy Logic by Using Mobile Robots

We report students' experiments with a small mobile robot Khepera developed in the Microcomputing Laboratory of Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (LAMI-EPFL). Khepera makes teaching of fuzzy-control theory easier and more compelling for students. In the experiments, reported in this paper, students learn how to implement a simple fuzzy control algorithm for obstacle avoidance. The students have to build a fuzzy controller step-by-step using software package LabVIEW. Although very simple, this experiment focuses on methodology required for building controllers based on fuzzy logic. It allows students to understand basic fuzzy logic concepts, the advantages and drawbacks of fuzzy controllers as well as the difficulties of their practical design.