Unmanned vehicles in Russia

Unmanned vehicles remain a controversial topic in terms of safety, but continue to actively develop and be introduced into everyday life, including in Russia. Unmanned vehicles are already driving through the streets of cities, albeit with a “safety” driver. Much earlier, developments began to be used for cargo transportation and work in difficult conditions. Now in Russia, more than one company is engaged in the development of unmanned technologies and presents their concepts.

History of development

The introduction of unmanned vehicles on the road in Russia began around 2018 – then the first unmanned vehicles already appeared in Moscow. At the same time, legislation began to be modified – GAZ, KAMAZ, Sberbank and Yandex developed a plan to bring unmanned vehicles to the roads. A decree was even written allowing an experiment on the introduction of such cars.

Until now, a mandatory condition is that the driver continues to be behind the wheel of the vehicle for safety net in case of an emergency. At the same time, in 2021 Russia, together with a number of other countries tried amend the convention on road traffic to remove unnecessary restrictions.

However, the technology has received the greatest development not in the urban environment, but among trucks and SUVs. Particularly high demand for unmanned vehicles is observed in mining industry. This is partly due to a shortage of personnel – a dump truck driver often has to work in adverse conditions, even in places with high radioactivity. The American company Caterpillar at the end of the last century developed electronic unmanned mining truck – the need for this type of equipment was so high.

Another area of ​​​​use of unmanned vehicles is the agro-industry. Cognitive Pilot (one of Sber’s joint ventures) developed autonomous control system for grain harvesters. Their tests led to a good result – a decrease in the number of accidents, direct crop losses, and fuel consumption. Already in 2020, such combines collected more than 700 tons of crop during testing in 35 regions, saving about 500 million rubles.

Since unmanned vehicles allow not to involve people in work in adverse conditions, they are also used in the development of the Arctic. Gazprom Neft trucks become be used as early as 2023. Also getting ready to launch an unmanned corridor for trucks on the Moscow-St. Petersburg highway.

What technologies are used

For unmanned vehicles distinguish six levels of autonomy. So far, the maximum level in the world that cars for passenger transportation have been able to reach is the fourth. Such a car can, under ideal conditions, completely independently drive a path. For the transportation of goods, a transport of a higher fifth level has already been developed.

It takes a long time to increase the degree of autonomy. The car must drive several hundred thousand kilometers, record and process the appropriate amount of information. Then it is used to train all new vehicles. At the same time, since there were precedents for hacking autopilots and their database when transmitted over the Internet, some companies (for example, Yandex) use hard drives or SSDs for accumulation.

The machine evaluates the surroundings with the help of various cameras on all sides. Usually, a lidar is installed on the roof – a sensor to determine the distance. Radars are also attached at the bottom – they are used to determine the position in space of the car itself.

The device of Yandex unmanned vehicles. Source: https://sdg.yandex.com/

Yandex uses its own improved maps for navigation. They contain information, including the separation of lanes on a specific section of the road – if the markings are erased, the car will know about the current mode of movement on the map. The maps are updated in real time with information about ongoing road repairs and other possible obstacles.

Developers and Models

Some firms have already launched their developments on the road, while others have only presented concepts. Legislation restrictions do not allow to fully test models that do not at all imply human participation in management. However, these also exist and are gradually being improved.

KAMAZ

In collaboration with the developers of computer vision Cognitive Pilot, Odyssey was developed in 2019 – it was intended for movement along a closed route inside the plant. Later was developed already unmanned dump truck “Jupiter-30” in cooperation with MSTU. N. E. Bauman. Such a drone is capable of carrying a load of 30 tons at a speed of 56 km per hour.

In 2018, KAMAZ-1221 SHUTTLE, developed jointly with NAMI, was presented – a small autopilot bus for transporting passengers. He, like “Jupiter”, does not provide for a driver in his design at all and is able to move along a certain route. Company plans fully launch trucks on the highway between Moscow and St. Petersburg in June 2023.

An unmanned dump truck and an unmanned passenger bus presented by KAMAZ. Source: https://kamaz.ru

Volgabus Matrёshka

The company has developed own modular drone for the transport of passengers and cargo. Modularity allows quick repairs and maintenance. The electric car charges in four hours, the battery is enough for 130 km. The design does not imply the presence of a driver at all, all mechanisms are controlled centrally by a single mechanism. Passengers can choose their own itinerary. These are mobile developments not intended for large transportation. Their maximum speed is limited to 30 km/h, and their carrying capacity is 1300 kg.

Unmanned development Volgabus MatrЁshka. Source: https://www.volgabus.ru/matreshka/

BaseTracK

This company initially positioned itself as a technology developer for unmanned vehicles. Their technologies were used to create the GAZelle Next Eva, a prototype of an unmanned fixed-route taxi. This is not a full-fledged drone, but rather a driver assistance system. It allows you to get some of the benefits of using unmanned technology – in particular, reduce fuel consumption. In fact, the driver is responsible for the steering wheel, and other systems are partially or completely controlled by a computer. Manufacturers abandoned lidars and other computer vision mechanisms, leaving only high-precision navigation systems.

SberAutoTech

Sber has also been involved in other self-driving car ventures, but has not missed the opportunity to develop its own model. Their technology is used both in passenger cars, providing for the presence of a driver, and in fully autonomous devices. Development FLIP similar to the modular drone from MatrЁshka – capable of carrying six passengers completely without a driver. SberAutoTech decided to use removable batteries so as not to waste time charging vehicles. The system can process up to 2 TB of data daily for its training.

Yandex

Project Self Driving Cars from Yandex is aimed mainly at cars. The company actively conducted tests in Russia, Israel, and also the USA. After the events of February 2022, testing unmanned vehicles abroad became difficult, but the company had previously managed to agree on the allocation of some areas of Moscow for experiments.

Their developments have already been launched on the streets and at first glance may not differ from other Yandex machines, primarily due to the person in the driver’s seat. However, it is needed only for safety net, but in fact the car moves due to internal systems. However, Yandex is often criticized for the fact that the corporation does not disclose the frequency of human intervention in driving during tests.

Results and prospects

In general, Russian developers have shown that they are quite coping with the development of computer vision technology and unmanned vehicles in general. Most of the obstacles to the development of the sphere come down to economic and political reasons. Due to the events in Ukraine, the supply of important components used by Russian manufacturers was disrupted, testing conditions worsened, the budget of companies decreased, and most importantly, the purchasing power of the population.

Among the main reasons why unmanned vehicles may not find distribution in Russia, there was also a high demand among Russians for budget models of transport. Unmanned vehicles will be clearly more expensive and there may simply be no demand for them, especially in the current environment. There is an exception – these are miners and gold miners, who can potentially buy unmanned dump trucks.

Too slow changes in the legislative base are also making their contribution. The lack of legal regulation of drones was official reason termination of cooperation between Sberbank and Cognitive Technologies. There are also risks from the culture of driving – there have been concerns that drivers may deliberately provoke and “test” drones on the roads.