Active damping in a flexible manipulator

Viewgraphs on active damping in a flexible manipulator are presented. Topics covered include: Shuttle Remote Manipulator System (SRMS); flexible structures; vibration; modeling of a flexible manipulator dynamical structure; designing control law criterion that minimizes vibration; and candidate application of fuzzy logic control law to the problem

Telerobotic control of a mobile coordinated robotic server

The annual report on telerobotic control of a mobile coordinated robotic server is presented. The goal of this effort is to develop advanced control methods for flexible space manipulator systems. As such, an adaptive fuzzy logic controller was developed in which model structure as well as parameter constraints are not required for compensation. The work builds upon previous work on fuzzy logic controllers. Fuzzy logic controllers have been growing in importance in the field of automatic feedback control. Hardware controllers using fuzzy logic have become available as an alternative to the traditional PID controllers. Software has also been introduced to aid in the development of fuzzy logic rule-bases. The advantages of using fuzzy logic controllers include the ability to merge the experience and intuition of expert operators into the rule-base and that a model of the system is not required to construct the controller. A drawback of the classical fuzzy logic controller, however, is the many parameters needed to be turned off-line prior to application in the closed-loop. In this report, an adaptive fuzzy logic controller is developed requiring no system model or model structure. The rule-base is defined to approximate a state-feedback controller while a second fuzzy logic algorithm varies, on-line, parameters of the defining controller. Results indicate the approach is viable for on-line adaptive control of systems when the model is too complex or uncertain for application of other more classical control techniques

Intelligent active force control of a three-link manipulator using fuzzy logic

The paper presents a novel approach to estimate the inertia matrix of a robot arm using a fuzzy logic (FL) mechanism in order to trigger the active force control (AFC) strategy. A comprehensive study is performed on a rigid three-link manipulator subjected to a number of external disturbances. The robustness and effectiveness of the proposed control scheme are investigated considering the trajectory track performance of the robotic arm taking into account the application of external disturbances and that the arm is commanded to describe a reference trajectory given a number of initial and operating conditions. The results show that the FL mechanism used in the study successfully computes appropriate estimated inertia matrix value to execute the control action. The proposed scheme exhibits a high degree of robustness and accuracy as the track error is bounded within an acceptable range of value even under the influence of the introduced disturbances

Summary report: A preliminary investigation into the use of fuzzy logic for the control of redundant manipulators

The Rice University Department of Mechanical Engineering and Materials Sciences' Robotics Group designed and built an eight degree of freedom redundant manipulator. Fuzzy logic was proposed as a control scheme for tasks not directly controlled by a human operator. In preliminary work, fuzzy logic control was implemented for a camera tracking system and a six degree of freedom manipulator. Both preliminary systems use real time vision data as input to fuzzy controllers. Related projects include integration of tactile sensing and fuzzy control of a redundant snake-like arm that is under construction

Fuzzy logic control of telerobot manipulators

Telerobot systems for advanced applications will require manipulators with redundant 'degrees of freedom' (DOF) that are capable of adapting manipulator configurations to avoid obstacles while achieving the user specified goal. Conventional methods for control of manipulators (based on solution of the inverse kinematics) cannot be easily extended to these situations. Fuzzy logic control offers a possible solution to these needs. A current research program at SRI developed a fuzzy logic controller for a redundant, 4 DOF, planar manipulator. The manipulator end point trajectory can be specified by either a computer program (robot mode) or by manual input (teleoperator). The approach used expresses end-point error and the location of manipulator joints as fuzzy variables. Joint motions are determined by a fuzzy rule set without requiring solution of the inverse kinematics. Additional rules for sensor data, obstacle avoidance and preferred manipulator configuration, e.g., 'righty' or 'lefty', are easily accommodated. The procedure used to generate the fuzzy rules can be extended to higher DOF systems

Design of stable adaptive fuzzy control.

by John Tak Kuen Koo.Thesis (M.Phil.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 1994.Includes bibliographical references (leaves 217-[220]).Chapter 1 --- Introduction --- p.1Chapter 1.1 --- Introduction --- p.1Chapter 1.2 --- "Robust, Adaptive and Fuzzy Control" --- p.2Chapter 1.3 --- Adaptive Fuzzy Control --- p.4Chapter 1.4 --- Object of Study --- p.10Chapter 1.5 --- Scope of the Thesis --- p.13Chapter 2 --- Background on Adaptive Control and Fuzzy Logic Control --- p.17Chapter 2.1 --- Adaptive control --- p.17Chapter 2.1.1 --- Model reference adaptive systems --- p.20Chapter 2.1.2 --- MIT Rule --- p.23Chapter 2.1.3 --- Model Reference Adaptive Control (MRAC) --- p.24Chapter 2.2 --- Fuzzy Logic Control --- p.33Chapter 2.2.1 --- Fuzzy sets and logic --- p.33Chapter 2.2.2 --- Fuzzy Relation --- p.40Chapter 2.2.3 --- Inference Mechanisms --- p.43Chapter 2.2.4 --- Defuzzification --- p.49Chapter 3 --- Explicit Form of a Class of Fuzzy Logic Controllers --- p.51Chapter 3.1 --- Introduction --- p.51Chapter 3.2 --- Construction of a class of fuzzy controller --- p.53Chapter 3.3 --- Explicit form of the fuzzy controller --- p.57Chapter 3.4 --- Design criteria on the fuzzy controller --- p.65Chapter 3.5 --- B-Spline fuzzy controller --- p.68Chapter 4 --- Model Reference Adaptive Fuzzy Control (MRAFC) --- p.73Chapter 4.1 --- Introduction --- p.73Chapter 4.2 --- "Fuzzy Controller, Plant and Reference Model" --- p.75Chapter 4.3 --- Derivation of the MRAFC adaptive laws --- p.79Chapter 4.4 --- "Extension to the Multi-Input, Multi-Output Case" --- p.84Chapter 4.5 --- Simulation --- p.90Chapter 5 --- MRAFC on a Class of Nonlinear Systems: Type I --- p.97Chapter 5.1 --- Introduction --- p.98Chapter 5.2 --- Choice of Controller --- p.99Chapter 5.3 --- Derivation of the MRAFC adaptive laws --- p.102Chapter 5.4 --- Example: Stabilization of a pendulum --- p.109Chapter 6 --- MRAFC on a Class of Nonlinear Systems: Type II --- p.112Chapter 6.1 --- Introduction --- p.113Chapter 6.2 --- Fuzzy System as Function Approximator --- p.114Chapter 6.3 --- Construction of MRAFC for the nonlinear systems --- p.118Chapter 6.4 --- Input-Output Linearization --- p.130Chapter 6.5 --- MRAFC with Input-Output Linearization --- p.132Chapter 6.6 --- Example --- p.136Chapter 7 --- Analysis of MRAFC System --- p.140Chapter 7.1 --- Averaging technique --- p.140Chapter 7.2 --- Parameter convergence --- p.143Chapter 7.3 --- Robustness --- p.152Chapter 7.4 --- Simulation --- p.157Chapter 8 --- Application of MRAFC scheme on Manipulator Control --- p.166Chapter 8.1 --- Introduction --- p.166Chapter 8.2 --- Robot Manipulator Control --- p.170Chapter 8.3 --- MRAFC on Robot Manipulator Control --- p.173Chapter 8.3.1 --- Part A: Nonlinear-function feedback fuzzy controller --- p.174Chapter 8.3.2 --- Part B: State-feedback fuzzy controller --- p.182Chapter 8.4 --- Simulation --- p.186Chapter 9 --- Conclusion --- p.199Chapter A --- Implementation of MRAFC Scheme with Practical Issues --- p.203Chapter A.1 --- Rule Generation by MRAFC scheme --- p.203Chapter A.2 --- Implementation Considerations --- p.211Chapter A.3 --- MRAFC System Design Procedure --- p.215Bibliography --- p.21

A new approach for designing self-organizing systems and application to adaptive control

There is tremendous interest in the design of intelligent machines capable of autonomous learning and skillful performance under complex environments. A major task in designing such systems is to make the system plastic and adaptive when presented with new and useful information and stable in response to irrelevant events. A great body of knowledge, based on neuro-physiological concepts, has evolved as a possible solution to this problem. Adaptive resonance theory (ART) is a classical example under this category. The system dynamics of an ART network is described by a set of differential equations with nonlinear functions. An approach for designing self-organizing networks characterized by nonlinear differential equations is proposed

Grasping and Control Issues in Adaptive End Effectors

Research into robotic grasping and manipulation has led to the development of a large number of tendon based end effectors. Many are, however, developed as a research tool, which are limited in application to the laboratory environment. The main reason being that the designs requiring a large number of actuators to be controlled. Due to the space and safety requirements, very few have been developed and commissioned for industrial applications. This paper presents design of a rigid link finger operated by a minimum number of actuators, which may be suitable for a number of adaptive end effectors. The adaptive nature built into the end effector (due to limited number of actuators) presents considerable problems in grasping and control. The paper discusses the issues associated with such designs. The research can be applicable to any adaptive end effectors that are controlled by limited number of actuators and evaluates their suitability in industrial environments