Parallel Robot Calibration Utilizing Adaptronic Joints

Author(s):  
Philipp Last ◽  
Annika Raatz ◽  
Ju¨rgen Hesselbach ◽  
Nenad Pavlovic ◽  
Ralf Keimer

Model based geometric calibration is well known to be an efficient way to enhance absolute accuracy of robotic systems. Generally its application requires redundant measurements, which are achieved by external metrology equipment in most traditional calibration techniques. However, these methods are usually time-consuming, expensive and inconvenient. Thus, so-called self-calibration methods have achieved attention from researchers, which either use internal sensors or rely on mechanical constraints instead. In this paper a new self-calibration technique is presented for parallel robots which is motivated by the idea of constrained calibration. The new approach utilizes a special machine component called the adaptronic swivel joint in order to achieve the required redundant information. Compared to similar approaches it offers several advantages. The new calibration scheme is described and verified in simulation studies using a RRRRR-structure as an example.

1999 ◽  
Author(s):  
Chunhe Gong ◽  
Jingxia Yuan ◽  
Jun Ni

Abstract Robot calibration plays an increasingly important role in manufacturing. For robot calibration on the manufacturing floor, it is desirable that the calibration technique be easy and convenient to implement. This paper presents a new self-calibration method to calibrate and compensate for robot system kinematic errors. Compared with the traditional calibration methods, this calibration method has several unique features. First, it is not necessary to apply an external measurement system to measure the robot end-effector position for the purpose of kinematic identification since the robot measurement system has a sensor as its integral part. Second, this self-calibration is based on distance measurement rather than absolute position measurement for kinematic identification; therefore the calibration of the transformation from the world coordinate system to the robot base coordinate system, known as base calibration, is not necessary. These features not only greatly facilitate the robot system calibration but also shorten the error propagation chain, therefore, increase the accuracy of parameter estimation. An integrated calibration system is designed to validate the effectiveness of this calibration method. Experimental results show that after calibration there is a significant improvement of robot accuracy over a typical robot workspace.


2013 ◽  
Vol 2013 ◽  
pp. 1-10 ◽  
Author(s):  
Guanglong Du ◽  
Ping Zhang

Robot calibration is a useful diagnostic method for improving the positioning accuracy in robot production and maintenance. An online robot self-calibration method based on inertial measurement unit (IMU) is presented in this paper. The method requires that the IMU is rigidly attached to the robot manipulator, which makes it possible to obtain the orientation of the manipulator with the orientation of the IMU in real time. This paper proposed an efficient approach which incorporates Factored Quaternion Algorithm (FQA) and Kalman Filter (KF) to estimate the orientation of the IMU. Then, an Extended Kalman Filter (EKF) is used to estimate kinematic parameter errors. Using this proposed orientation estimation method will result in improved reliability and accuracy in determining the orientation of the manipulator. Compared with the existing vision-based self-calibration methods, the great advantage of this method is that it does not need the complex steps, such as camera calibration, images capture, and corner detection, which make the robot calibration procedure more autonomous in a dynamic manufacturing environment. Experimental studies on a GOOGOL GRB3016 robot show that this method has better accuracy, convenience, and effectiveness than vision-based methods.


2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (11) ◽  
pp. 2182 ◽  
Author(s):  
Han Yuan ◽  
Xianghui You ◽  
Yongqing Zhang ◽  
Wenjing Zhang ◽  
Wenfu Xu

Cable-driven parallel robots are suitable candidates for rehabilitation due to their intrinsic flexibility and adaptability, especially considering the safety of human–robot interaction. However, there are still some challenges to apply cable-driven parallel robots to rehabilitation, one of which is the geometric calibration. This paper proposes a new automatic calibration method that is applicable for cable-driven parallel rehabilitation robots. The key point of this method is to establish the mapping between the unknown parameters to be calibrated and the parameters that could be measured by the inner sensors and then use least squares algorithm to find the solutions. Specifically, the unknown parameters herein are the coordinates of the attachment points, and the measured parameters are the lengths of the redundant cables. Simulations are performed on a 3-DOF parallel robot driven by four cables for validation. Results show that the proposed calibration method could precisely find the real coordinate values of the attachment points, with errors less than 10 − 12 mm. Trajectory simulations also indicate that the positioning accuracy of the cable-driven parallel robot (CDPR) could be greatly improved after calibration using the proposed method.


Robotica ◽  
2012 ◽  
Vol 31 (4) ◽  
pp. 657-667 ◽  
Author(s):  
Abraham Gonzalez-Hernandez ◽  
Eduardo Castillo-Castaneda

SUMMARYThis work presents a methodology using image analysis to estimate the experimental stiffness of a parallel robot, Parallix LKF-2040, a 3-degree-of-freedom manipulator. The proposed methodology has a simple implementation and can be applied to different architectures of parallel robots. This methodology uses image analysis and camera calibration techniques to estimate compliant displacements of mobile platform produced by several loads at the end effector level, and calculate stiffness in a specific position of mobile platform. Experimental results are presented for different positions within the workspace.


Sensors ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 18 (7) ◽  
pp. 2392 ◽  
Author(s):  
XueJun Jin ◽  
Jinwoo Jung ◽  
Seong Ko ◽  
Eunpyo Choi ◽  
Jong-Oh Park ◽  
...  

A cable-driven parallel robot has benefits of wide workspace, high payload, and high dynamic response owing to its light cable actuator utilization. For wide workspace applications, in particular, the body frame becomes large to cover the wide workspace that causes robot kinematic errors resulting from geometric uncertainty. However, appropriate sensors as well as inexpensive and easy calibration methods to measure the actual robot kinematic parameters are not currently available. Hence, we present a calibration sensor device and an auto-calibration methodology for the over-constrained cable-driven parallel robots using one-dimension laser distance sensors attached to the robot end-effector, to overcome the robot geometric uncertainty and to implement precise robot control. A novel calibration workflow with five phases—preparation, modeling, measuring, identification, and adjustment—is proposed. The proposed calibration algorithms cover the cable-driven parallel robot kinematics, as well as uncertainty modeling such as cable elongation and pulley kinematics. We performed extensive simulations and experiments to verify the performance of the suggested method using the MINI cable robot. The experimental results show that the kinematic parameters can be identified correctly with 0.92 mm accuracy, and the robot position control accuracy is increased by 58%. Finally, we verified that the developed calibration sensor devices and the calibration methodology are applicable to the massive-size cable-driven parallel robot system.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mohamed Helal

Industrial robot calibration packages, such as ABB CalibWare, are developed only for robot calibration. As a result, the robotic tooling systems designed and fabricated by the user are often calibrated in an ad-hoc fashion. In this thesis, a systematic way for robotic tooling calibration is presented in order to overcome this problem. The idea is to include the tooling system as an extended body in the robot kinematic model, from which two error models are established. The first error model is associated with the robot, while the second error model is associated with the tooling. Once the robot is fully calibrated, the first error will be reduced to the required accuracy. Thus, the method is focused on the second error model. For the tool error calibration, two formulations were used. The first is a linear formulation based on conventional calibration as well as self-calibration methods while the second is a nonlinear formulation. The conventional linear formulation was extensively investigated and implemented while the self-calibration was proven to be inadequate for the tooling calibration. Moreover, the nonlinear formulation was demonstrated to be very effective and accurate through experimental result. The end-effector position estimation as well as the tool pose estimation were obtained using a 3D vision system as an off-line error measurement technique.


2007 ◽  
Vol 5 ◽  
pp. 29-35 ◽  
Author(s):  
I. Rolfes

Abstract. In this contribution, different obstacle-based self-calibration techniques for the measurement of the dielectric properties of liquids are investigated at microwave frequencies. The liquid under test is contained inside a waveguide, which is connected to the ports of a vector network analyzer. The permittivity of the liquid is characterized on the basis of the measured scattering parameters. In order to extract the material parameters precisely and to eliminate systematic errors of the setup, calibration measurements have to be performed. For this purpose, different self-calibration methods based on the displacement of an obstacle are considered. The presented methods differ in that way, that either transmission and reflection measurements or purely reflection measurements are performed. All these methods have in common that the material parameters are already calculable within a so-called self-calibration procedure. Thus, a full two-port calibration of the whole setup is not necessary. Furthermore, the methods can be realized effectively in a practical setup having the advantage that a rearrangement of the setup is not needed for the material parameter measurements and that the liquid under investigation can pass continuously through the measurement cell. This might be of interest for the application in an industrial process, enabling the continuous flow of the material while the parameter characterization can take place at the same time.


2011 ◽  
pp. 70-129
Author(s):  
B. J. Lei ◽  
E. A. Hendriks ◽  
Aggelos K. Katsaggelos

This chapter presents an extensive overview of passive camera calibration techniques. Starting with a detailed introduction and mathematical description of the imaging process of an off-the-shelf camera, it reviews all existing passive calibration approaches with increasing complexity. All algorithms are presented in detail so that they are directly applicable. For completeness, a brief counting about the self-calibration is also provided. In addition, two typical applications are given of passive camera calibration methods for specific problems of face model reconstruction and telepresence and experimentally evaluated. It is expected that this chapter can serve as a standard reference. Researchers in various fields in which passive camera calibration is actively or potentially of interest can use this chapter to identify the appropriate techniques suitable for their applications.


1999 ◽  
Vol 122 (1) ◽  
pp. 174-181 ◽  
Author(s):  
Chunhe Gong ◽  
Jingxia Yuan ◽  
Jun Ni

Robot calibration plays an increasingly important role in manufacturing. For robot calibration on the manufacturing floor, it is desirable that the calibration technique be easy and convenient to implement. This paper presents a new self-calibration method to calibrate and compensate for robot system kinematic errors. Compared with the traditional calibration methods, this calibration method has several unique features. First, it is not necessary to apply an external measurement system to measure the robot end-effector position for the purpose of kinematic identification since the robot measurement system has a sensor as its integral part. Second, this self-calibration is based on distance measurement rather than absolute position measurement for kinematic identification; therefore the calibration of the transformation from the world coordinate system to the robot base coordinate system, known as base calibration, is not necessary. These features not only greatly facilitate the robot system calibration, but also shorten the error propagation chain, therefore, increase the accuracy of parameter estimation. An integrated calibration system is designed to validate the effectiveness of this calibration method. Experimental results show that after calibration there is a significant improvement of robot accuracy over a typical robot workspace. [S1087-1357(00)01301-0]


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mohamed Helal

Industrial robot calibration packages, such as ABB CalibWare, are developed only for robot calibration. As a result, the robotic tooling systems designed and fabricated by the user are often calibrated in an ad-hoc fashion. In this thesis, a systematic way for robotic tooling calibration is presented in order to overcome this problem. The idea is to include the tooling system as an extended body in the robot kinematic model, from which two error models are established. The first error model is associated with the robot, while the second error model is associated with the tooling. Once the robot is fully calibrated, the first error will be reduced to the required accuracy. Thus, the method is focused on the second error model. For the tool error calibration, two formulations were used. The first is a linear formulation based on conventional calibration as well as self-calibration methods while the second is a nonlinear formulation. The conventional linear formulation was extensively investigated and implemented while the self-calibration was proven to be inadequate for the tooling calibration. Moreover, the nonlinear formulation was demonstrated to be very effective and accurate through experimental result. The end-effector position estimation as well as the tool pose estimation were obtained using a 3D vision system as an off-line error measurement technique.


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