Three Dimensional Robot Path Planning With Workspace Considerations
Abstract This paper considers the problem of robot path planning by optimization methods. It focuses on the use of recursive quadratic programming (RQP) for the optimization process and presents a formulation of the three dimensional path planning problem developed for compatibility with the RQP selling. An approach 10 distance-to-contact and interference calculations appropriate for RQP is described as well as a strategy for gradient computations which are critical to applying any efficient nonlinear programming method. Symbolic computation has been used for general six degree-of-freedom transformations of the robot links and to provide analytical derivative expressions. Example problems in path planning are presented for a simple 3-D robot. One example includes adjustments in geometry and introduces the concept of integrating 3-D path planning with geometric design.