  This preprint presents the current status of research into the development
and application of an autonomous, self-driving compost turner. The aim is to
overcome challenges in the composting industry, such as adverse working
conditions, by automating the composting process. The preprint provides a
comprehensive overview of the overall concept of the self-driving compost
turner, including the hardware architecture with sensors, navigation module and
control module. In addition, the methodical development of the architecture of
concepts, models and their subsequent software integration in ROS using
model-based systems engineering is described. The validation and verification
of the overall system is carried out in an industrial environment using three
scenarios. The capabilities of the compost turner are demonstrated by
autonomously following predefined trajectories in the composting plant and
performing the required composting tasks. The results show that the autonomous
compost turner is capable of performing the required activities. In addition,
the compost turner has intelligent processing capabilities for compost data as
well as its transmission, visualization and storage in a cloud server. It is
important to note that this work is a preprint that represents the current
state of research. The authors aim to publish the full paper in a peer-reviewed
journal in the near future.
