scholarly journals Geometrico-Static Analysis of a New Collaborative Parallel Robot for Safe Physical Interaction

Author(s):  
Guillaume Jeanneau ◽  
Vincent Bégoc ◽  
Sébastien Briot

Abstract This paper introduces a geometrico-static analysis of an intrinsically safe parallel manipulator called R-Min. This robot was designed to reduce the risk of injury during a collision with a human operator, thanks to an underactuated architecture which enables large internal displacements in case of a collision. Indeed, the R-Min architecture is based on a modification of the well-known planar five-bar mechanism, where additional passive joints are introduced on the distal links in order to create a planar seven-bar mechanism with two degrees of underactuation. These two additional degrees of freedom are passively driven through the use of a supplementary passive leg, in which a tension spring is mounted between the base and the end-effector. In this paper, the conditions satisfying the equilibrium and the stability of the mechanism are introduced, based on a geometrico-static analysis. The direct and inverse problems are then solved using a numerical approach. Solutions to both problems are presented and classified. One subset of solutions to the inverse problem is isolated and projected in the Cartesian space in order to obtain the payload-invariant workspace of the R-Min robot.

2021 ◽  
Vol 8 ◽  
Author(s):  
Zubair Iqbal ◽  
Maria Pozzi ◽  
Domenico Prattichizzo ◽  
Gionata Salvietti

Collaborative robots promise to add flexibility to production cells thanks to the fact that they can work not only close to humans but also with humans. The possibility of a direct physical interaction between humans and robots allows to perform operations that were inconceivable with industrial robots. Collaborative soft grippers have been recently introduced to extend this possibility beyond the robot end-effector, making humans able to directly act on robotic hands. In this work, we propose to exploit collaborative grippers in a novel paradigm in which these devices can be easily attached and detached from the robot arm and used also independently from it. This is possible only with self-powered hands, that are still quite uncommon in the market. In the presented paradigm not only hands can be attached/detached to/from the robot end-effector as if they were simple tools, but they can also remain active and fully functional after detachment. This ensures all the advantages brought in by tool changers, that allow for quick and possibly automatic tool exchange at the robot end-effector, but also gives the possibility of using the hand capabilities and degrees of freedom without the need of an arm or of external power supplies. In this paper, the concept of detachable robotic grippers is introduced and demonstrated through two illustrative tasks conducted with a new tool changer designed for collaborative grippers. The novel tool changer embeds electromagnets that are used to add safety during attach/detach operations. The activation of the electromagnets is controlled through a wearable interface capable of providing tactile feedback. The usability of the system is confirmed by the evaluations of 12 users.


Robotica ◽  
2013 ◽  
Vol 31 (6) ◽  
pp. 887-904 ◽  
Author(s):  
M. H. Korayem ◽  
M. Bamdad ◽  
H. Tourajizadeh ◽  
A. H. Korayem ◽  
R. M. Zehtab ◽  
...  

SUMMARYIn this paper, design, dynamic, and control of the motors of a spatial cable robot are presented considering flexibility of the joints. End-effector control in order to control all six spatial degrees of freedom (DOFs) of the system and motor control in order to control the joints flexibility are proposed here. Corresponding programing of its operation is done by formulating the kinematics and dynamics and also control of the robot. Considering the existence of gearboxes, flexibility of the joints is modeled in the feed-forward term of its controller to achieve better accuracy. A two sequential closed-loop strategy consisting of proportional derivative (PD) for linear actuators in joint space and computed torque method for nonlinear end-effector in Cartesian space is presented for further accuracy. Flexibility is estimated using modeling and simulation by MATLAB and SimDesigner. A prototype has been built and experimental tests have been done to verify the efficiency of the proposed modeling and controller as well as the effect of flexibility of the joints. The ICaSbot (IUST Cable-Suspended robot) is an under-constrained six-DOF parallel robot actuated by the aid of six suspended cables. An experimental test is conducted for the manufactured flexible joint cable robot of ICaSbot and the outputs of sensors are compared with simulation. The efficiency of the proposed schemes is demonstrated.


2020 ◽  
Vol 142 (7) ◽  
Author(s):  
Sen Qian ◽  
Kunlong Bao ◽  
Bin Zi ◽  
W. D. Zhu

Abstract This paper presents a new trajectory planning method based on the improved quintic B-splines curves for a three degrees-of-freedom (3-DOF) cable-driven parallel robot (CDPR). First, the conditions of positive cables’ tension are expressed in terms of the position and acceleration constraints of the end-effector. Then, an improved B-spline curve is introduced, which is employed for generating a pick-and-place path by interpolating a set of given via-points. Meanwhile, by expressing the position and acceleration of the end-effector in terms of the first and second derivatives of the improved B-spline, the cable tension constraints are described in the form of B-spline parameters. According to the properties of the defined pick-and-place path, the proposed motion profile is dominated by two factors: the time taken for the end-effector to pass through all the via-points and the ratio between the nodes of B-spline. The two factors are determined through multi-objective optimization based on the efficiency coefficient method. Finally, experimental results on a 3-DOF CDPR show that the improved B-spline exhibits overall superior behavior in terms of velocity, acceleration, and cables force compared with the traditional B-spline. The validity of the proposed trajectory planning method is proved through the experiments.


2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Oleksandr Stepanenko ◽  
Ilian A. Bonev ◽  
Dimiter Zlatanov

We present a novel 4-DOF (degrees of freedom) parallel robot designed for five-axis micromachining applications. Two of its five telescoping legs operate simultaneously, thus acting as an extensible parallelogram linkage, and in conjunction with two other legs control the position of the tooltip. The fifth leg controls the tilt of the end-effector (a spindle), while a turntable fixed at the base of the robot controls the swivel of the workpiece. The robot is capable of tilting its end-effector up to 90 deg, for any tooltip position. In this paper, we study the mobility of the new parallel kinematic machine (PKM), describe its inverse and direct kinematic models, then study its singularities, and analyze its workspace. Finally, we propose a potential mechanical design for this PKM utilizing telescopic actuators as well as the procedure for optimizing it. In addition, we discuss the possibility of using constant-length legs and base-mounted linear actuators in order to increase the volume of the workspace.


Author(s):  
Saeed Behzadipour ◽  
Robert Dekker ◽  
Amir Khajepour ◽  
Edmon Chan

The growing needs for high speed positioning devices in the automated manufacturing industry have been challenged by robotic science for more than two decades. Parallel manipulators have been widely used for this purpose due to their advantage of lower moving inertia over the conventional serial manipulators. Cable actuated parallel robots were introduced in 1980’s to reduce the moving inertia even further. In this work, a new cable-based parallel robot is introduced. For this robot, the cables are used not only to actuate the end-effector but also to apply the necessary kinematic constraints to provide three pure translational degrees of freedom. In order to maintain tension in the cables, a passive air cylinder is used to push the end-effector against the stationary platform. In addition to low moving inertia, the new design benefits from simplicity and low manufacturing cost by eliminating joints from the robot’s mechanism. The design procedure and the results of experiments will be discussed in the following.


Robotica ◽  
2012 ◽  
Vol 31 (2) ◽  
pp. 193-202 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yongjie Zhao

SUMMARYPerformance evaluation of a parallel robot is a multicriteria problem. By taking Delta robot as an object of study, this paper presents the kinematic performance evaluation of a three translational degrees-of-freedom parallel robot from the viewpoint of singularity, isotropy, and velocity transmission. It is shown that the determinant of a Jacobian matrix cannot measure the distance from the singular configuration due to the existing inverse kinematic singularity of a Delta robot. The determinants of inverse and direct kinematic Jacobian matrices are adopted for the measurement of distance from the singular configuration based on the theory of numerical linear dependence. The denominator of the Jacobian matrix will be lost in the computation of the condition number when the end-effector is on the centerline of the workspace, so the Delta robot may also be nearly at a singular configuration when the condition number of the Jacobian matrix is equal to 1. The velocity transmission index whose physical meaning is the maximum input angular velocity when the end-effector translates in the unit velocity is presented. The evaluation of singularity, isotropy, and velocity transmission of a Delta robot is investigated by simulation. The velocity transmission index can also be used for the velocity transmission evaluation of a parallel robot with pure rotational degrees-of-freedom based on the principle of similarity. The physical meaning is modified to be the maximum input velocity when the end-effector rotates in the unit angular velocity.


2016 ◽  
Vol 8 (6) ◽  
Author(s):  
Tian Huang ◽  
Pujun Bai ◽  
Jiangping Mei ◽  
Derek G. Chetwynd

This paper presents a comprehensive methodology for ensuring the geometric pose accuracy of a 4DOF high-speed pick-and-place parallel robot having an articulated traveling plate. The process is implemented by four steps: (1) formulation of the error model containing all possible geometric source errors; (2) tolerance design of the source errors affecting the uncompensatable pose accuracy via sensitivity analysis; (3) identification of the source errors affecting the compensatable pose accuracy via a simplified model and distance measurements; and (4) development of a linearized error compensator for real-time implementation. Experimental results show that a tilt angular accuracy of 0.1/100 and a volumetric/rotational accuracy of 0.5 mm/±0.8 deg of the end-effector can be achieved over the cylindrical task workspace.


Author(s):  
Salua Hamaza ◽  
Patrice Lambert ◽  
Marco Carricato ◽  
Just Herder

This paper explores the fundamentals of parallel robots with configurable platforms (PRCP), as well as the design and the kinematic analysis of those. The concept behind PRCP is that the rigid (non-configurable) end-effector is replaced by a closed-loop chain, the configurable platform. The use of a closed-loop chain allows the robot to interact with the environment from multiple contact points on the platform, which reflects the presence of multiple end-effectors. This results in a robot that successfully combines motion and grasping capabilities into a structure that provides an inherent high stiffness. This paper aims to introduce the QuadroG robot, a 4 degrees of freedom PRCP which finely merges planar motion together with grasping capabilities.


2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (5) ◽  
Author(s):  
Loïc Cuvillon ◽  
Xavier Weber ◽  
Jacques Gangloff

Abstract Cable-driven parallel robots are well suited for applications that require a very large workspace. Thanks to their lightweight moving parts, they can achieve high dynamics while remaining pretty safe for nearby human workers. Furthermore, their size depends only on the length of the cables; thus, their scale is almost totally decoupled from their cost. However, due to the cables, the stiffness is very low with respect to rigid link robots, inducing slowly damped oscillations of the end effector. Previous works have shown that those vibrations can be effectively damped by the winch actuators thanks to active vibration damping techniques. In this paper, a gain scheduling approach is proposed based on a linearized model of the robot dynamics. This model is projected in the modal space yielding six decoupled transfer functions for six degrees-of-freedom (DoFs) of a cable-driven parallel robot using thin cables. The stability of the proposed control law is analyzed for a static and a moving end effector. The proposed control algorithm is validated experimentally on an eight-cable suspended robot prototype.


2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (24) ◽  
pp. 9067
Author(s):  
Deng Lin ◽  
Giovanni Mottola ◽  
Marco Carricato ◽  
Xiaoling Jiang

Cable-driven parallel robots can provide interesting advantages over conventional robots with rigid links; in particular, robots with a cable-suspended architecture can have very large workspaces. Recent research has shown that dynamic trajectories allow the robot to further increase its workspace by taking advantage of inertial effects. In our work, we consider a three-degrees-of-freedom parallel robot suspended by three cables, with a point-mass end-effector. This model was considered in previous works to analyze the conditions for dynamical feasibility of a trajectory. Here, we enhance the robot’s capabilities by using it as a sling, that is, by throwing a mass at a suitable time. The mass is carried at the end-effector by a gripper, which releases the mass so that it can reach a given target point. Mathematical models are presented that provide guidelines for planning the trajectory. Moreover, results are shown from simulations that include the effect of cable elasticity. Finally, suggestions are offered regarding how such a trajectory can be optimized.


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