Shift Magazine - December 2021 - 22

last mile
Colo. company shows how, with sensors and software,
autonomous trucks could help make busy freight yards safer
BY JACK KEEBLER
A
t an innovative company in Golden,
Colo., called Outrider, autonomous
trucks hitch themselves
to trailers to safely and quickly
move freight - guided solely by their sensors
and sophisticated software.
Outrider builds, tests and sells these
trucks to large companies to move heavy
cargo quietly and efficiently inside massive
distribution yards.
With these battery-powered yard tractors,
Outrider's
cloud-based
software
guides and commands freight trailers rolling
at 5 to 15 mph to loading docks and
through parking lots, hitching and unhitching
them and their brake lines. The software
also tracks the inventory and monitors,
records and centrally controls the
yard's operations.
Outrider's experts say that robotic guidance
ensures a greater level of safety in
an often busy, messy and dangerous
freight-yard environment. CEO Andrew
Smith, who started the company in 2017,
also claims it speeds up the transition of
goods between the warehouse and the
road, with much less noise and fewer
emissions. Combined, the nation's overthe-road
trucks spend roughly 10 million
days each year in U.S. logistics yards to
drop off and pick up trailers.
Smith says Outrider is conducting 11
pilot programs with clients that want to
autonomously operate their distribution
yards. Last month, customer GeorgiaPacific,
a leading manufacturer and distributor
of consumer-packaged goods, completed
1,000 autonomous, zero-emission
trailer moves as part of its daily operations
at its Chicagoland distribution center in
Elwood, Ill.
22 shift * december 2021
Outrider builds, tests and sells battery-powered yard tractors to move heavy cargo.
" On an annual basis, there's over 10 billion
tons of freight moving through U.S. markets
alone, " Smith says. " And the majority
of that goes by truck, and the majority of
that goes through one type of distribution
center or another. And inside these distribution
centers are all kinds of customer pain
points. What you're hearing going on now is
that there is a shortage of people who want
to do these dull, dirty, dangerous jobs. "
A freight yard's shorter distances, lower
speeds and enclosed environments facilitate
the use of GPS, lidar, cameras, radar
and computerized truck-driving robotics.
These distribution centers
around the
globe are an important link in the supply
chain where goods are moved from warehouse
or factory out to the road system.
So many businesses are exploring ways to
automate to increase throughput, improve
efficiency and cargo tracking, lower pollution,
and enhance safety.
" It's a hazardous environment to have
humans around 80,000-pound pieces of
equipment operating through all kinds of
weather and at all times of day and night, "
Smith says. " And a big issue is misplaced
trailer assets. So, you'll have over-the-road
vehicles dropping things off, and then they
can't be found. And when you can't find
the right trailer filled with 40,000 pounds of
goods, that obviously slows things down. "
Outrider says that using perception,
motion planning and proprietary control
algorithms, its autonomous trucks
align optimally in front of a semitrailer,
back under the trailer and attach the fifth
wheel, the connection point of the truck,
to the kingpin, the connection point on the
trailer, with great precision.
Not only does the system connect
with accuracy, but it also uses sensors to
confirm a kingpin lock, without requiring
manual verification.
At present,
the electrically powered
trucks are plugged in by workers when
they're inspected between shifts. But
Smith says that in the future, they will be
charged by driving over inductive coils in
the yard, and charging will be scheduled
and monitored by the system's software.
In August, Outrider opened its Advanced
Testing Facility, a validation site in Brighton,
Colo., dedicated to customer distributionyard
automation. The 200,000-square-foot
yard with 49 dock doors operates 16 hours
a day, five days a week, and will expand to
24-hour operation in 2022. n
Shift Magazine - December 2021

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