Empirical Evaluation of Ultra Wideband for Shipyard 5.0

The future of the Industry 5.0 shipyard (Shipyard 5.0) entails real-time monitoring of products, by-products, and transport vehicles that circulate through it. There are various technologies available for this, being one of the most promising Ultra Wideband (UWB), which can provide centimeter-level precision indoor positioning. However, due to the interference caused by the presence of numerous metallic objects, its use in industrial environments like shipyards presents multiple challenges. In such a context, tests were carried out inside a workshop of Navantia in Fene (Galicia) to validate the use of UWB in a shipyard, where multiple anchors (reference beacons) were placed at different heights, seeking the optimal placement spot to cover the largest possible space without assuming a loss of precision in location. UWB tags were attached to elements such as pallets, pipes, or machinery, and the accuracy of their location was measured. The obtained results show a good precision, in the order of centimeters, in two-dimensional positioning, but a lower precision in three-dimensional positioning (between 0.5 and 1 m). To that end, the Gauss–Newton algorithm was evaluated, though the results show that its performance is better only in specific situations. In all cases, the results indicate that UWB will provide good precision in scenarios similar to the evaluated shipyard environment.