Machine Learning for Traffic Control of Unmanned Mining Machines : Using the Q-learning and SARSA algorithms

Sammanfattning: Manual configuration of rules for unmanned mining machine traffic control can be time-consuming and therefore expensive. This paper presents a Machine Learning approach for automatic configuration of rules for traffic control in mines with autonomous mining machines by using Q-learning and SARSA. The results show that automation might be able to cut the time taken to configure traffic rules from 1-2 weeks to a maximum of approximately 6 hours which would decrease the cost of deployment. Tests show that in the worst case the developed solution is able to run continuously for 24 hours 82% of the time compared to the 100% accuracy of the manual configuration. The conclusion is that machine learning can plausibly be used for the automatic configuration of traffic rules. Further work in increasing the accuracy to 100% is needed for it to replace manual configuration. It remains to be examined whether the conclusion retains pertinence in more complex environments with larger layouts and more machines.