Small robotic mowers have been around for years, but Honda is eyeing the professional market with their new Autonomous Work Mower (AWM).
Set to debut at Equip Exposition 2023, the prototype is being billed as Honda’s first battery-powered electric zero-turn riding mower. However, it’s far more notable for featuring autonomous driving technology.
According to Honda, the AWM can be driven manually in a “teaching” mode that enables the mower to learn “routes and patterns set by the operator.” As part of this process, a mowing route map is created using the Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) and then saved to the cloud.
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The next time that particular lawn needs to be mowed, the AWM can be used in autonomous “playback” mode. As the company explained, an operator moves the mower to the starting position and then downloads the desired route map. The AWM then goes to work and can avoid obstacles thanks to four radar and four LiDAR sensors.
The mower can go up to 6 mph (10 km/h) in autonomous mode and it automatically reduces its speed to prevent clogging or uncut grass. The prototype also has a 60 inch (1,524 mm) cutting deck and Honda noted it was designed to “help improve efficiency of lawn care and landscape maintenance companies.” In particular, instead of having one employee for weed whacking and another for mowing, companies could have one employee per jobsite as half the job could be done autonomously.
While the AWM is a prototype, Honda seems to be serious about the idea as they’re launching a pilot program next year. As part of the effort, they’ll team up with a handful of companies to test the mower in real-life work environments.
