Abstract: Robot vehicle guidance systems of the type which employ relative motion sensors to establish learned movement behavior along a pre-selected guidepath are improved by combining such relative motion programmed devices with apparatus for initially identifying environmental checkpoints and initially establishing the orientation of the vehicle with respect to the checkpoints. The propulsion system for the robot is responsive to both the relative motion guidance signals (for intermediate navigation between the checkpoints) and to the vehicle-checkpoint alignment information (to realign the vehicle with respect to the checkpoints). The robot vehicle is guided from the start to the finish position without reliance on a pre-selected guidepath and without compounding anomalous guidance errors induced by extraneous environmental effects.