A Model-Free Approach for Accurate Joint Motion Control in Humanoid Locomotion

A new model-free approach to precisely control humanoid robot joints is presented in this article. An input&-output online identification procedure will permit to compensate neglected or uncertain dynamics, such as, on the one hand, transmission and compliance nonlinear effects, and, on the other hand, network transmission delays. Robustness toparameter variations will be analyzed and compared to other advanced PID-based controllers. Simulations will show that not only good tracking quality can be obtained with this novel technique, but also that it provides a very robust behavior to the closed-loop system. Furthermore, a locomotion task will be tested in a complete humanoid simulatorto highlight the suitability of this control approach for such complex systems.This work has been supported by the CAM Project S2009/DPI-1559/ROBOCITY2030 II, developed by the research team RoboticsLab at the University Carlos III of Madrid.Publicad

Joint control of a robotic arm using particle swarm optimization based H2/H∞ robust control on arduino

This paper proposes a small structure of robust controller to control robotic arm’s joints where exist some uncertainties and unmodelled dynamics. Robotic arm is widely used now in the era of Industry 4.0. Nevertheless, the cost for an industry to migrate from a conventional automatic machine to industrial robot still very high. This become a significant challenge to middle or small size industry. Development of a low cost industrial robotic arm can be one of good solutions for them. However, a low-cost manipulator can bring more uncertainties. There might be exist more unmodelled dynamic in a low-cost system. A good controller to overcome such uncertainties and unmodelled dynamics is robust controller. A low-cost robotic arm might use small or medium size embedded controller such as Arduino. Therefore, the control algorithm should be a small order of controller. The synthesized controller was tested using MATLAB and then implemented on the real hardware to control a robotic manipulator. Both the simulation and the experiment showed that the proposed controller performed satisfactory results. It can control the joint position to the desired position even in the presence of uncertainties such as unmodelled dynamics and variation of loads or manipulator poses

Modelling an Industrial Robot and Its Impact on Productivity

[EN] This research aims to design an efficient algorithm leading to an improvement of productivity by posing a multi-objective optimization, in which both the time consumed to carry out scheduled tasks and the associated costs of the autonomous industrial system are minimized. The algorithm proposed models the kinematics and dynamics of the industrial robot, provides collision-free trajectories, allows to constrain the energy consumed and meets the physical characteristics of the robot (i.e., restriction on torque, jerks and power in all driving motors). Additionally, the trajectory tracking accuracy is improved using an adaptive fuzzy sliding mode control (AFSMC), which allows compensating for parametric uncertainties, bounded external disturbances and constraint uncertainties. Therefore, the system stability and robustness are enhanced; thus, overcoming some of the limitations of the traditional proportional-integral-derivative (PID) controllers. The trade-offs among the economic issues related to the assembly line and the optimal time trajectory of the desired motion are analyzed using Pareto fronts. The technique is tested in different examples for a six-degrees-of-freedom (DOF) robot system. Results have proved how the use of this methodology enhances the performance and reliability of assembly lines.Llopis-Albert, C.; Rubio Montoya, FJ.; Valero Chuliá, FJ. (2021). Modelling an Industrial Robot and Its Impact on Productivity. Mathematics. 9(7):1-13. https://doi.org/10.3390/math907076911397AOYAMA, T., NISHI, T., & ZHANG, G. (2017). Production planning problem with market impact under demand uncertainty. Journal of Advanced Mechanical Design, Systems, and Manufacturing, 11(2), JAMDSM0019-JAMDSM0019. doi:10.1299/jamdsm.2017jamdsm0019Llopis-Albert, C., Rubio, F., & Valero, F. (2015). Improving productivity using a multi-objective optimization of robotic trajectory planning. Journal of Business Research, 68(7), 1429-1431. doi:10.1016/j.jbusres.2015.01.027Rubio, F., Valero, F., Sunyer, J., & Cuadrado, J. (2012). Optimal time trajectories for industrial robots with torque, power, jerk and energy consumed constraints. Industrial Robot: An International Journal, 39(1), 92-100. doi:10.1108/01439911211192538Llopis-Albert, C., Rubio, F., & Valero, F. (2018). Optimization approaches for robot trajectory planning. Multidisciplinary Journal for Education, Social and Technological Sciences, 5(1), 1. doi:10.4995/muse.2018.9867Yang, Y., Pan, J., & Wan, W. (2019). Survey of optimal motion planning. IET Cyber-Systems and Robotics, 1(1), 13-19. doi:10.1049/iet-csr.2018.0003Gasparetto, A., & Zanotto, V. (2008). A technique for time-jerk optimal planning of robot trajectories. Robotics and Computer-Integrated Manufacturing, 24(3), 415-426. doi:10.1016/j.rcim.2007.04.001Mohammed, A., Schmidt, B., Wang, L., & Gao, L. (2014). Minimizing Energy Consumption for Robot Arm Movement. Procedia CIRP, 25, 400-405. doi:10.1016/j.procir.2014.10.055Van den Berg, J., Abbeel, P., & Goldberg, K. (2011). LQG-MP: Optimized path planning for robots with motion uncertainty and imperfect state information. The International Journal of Robotics Research, 30(7), 895-913. doi:10.1177/0278364911406562Liu, S., Sun, D., & Zhu, C. (2011). Coordinated Motion Planning for Multiple Mobile Robots Along Designed Paths With Formation Requirement. IEEE/ASME Transactions on Mechatronics, 16(6), 1021-1031. doi:10.1109/tmech.2010.2070843Plaku, E., Kavraki, L. E., & Vardi, M. Y. (2010). Motion Planning With Dynamics by a Synergistic Combination of Layers of Planning. IEEE Transactions on Robotics, 26(3), 469-482. doi:10.1109/tro.2010.2047820Rubio, F., Llopis-Albert, C., Valero, F., & Suñer, J. L. (2015). Assembly Line Productivity Assessment by Comparing Optimization-Simulation Algorithms of Trajectory Planning for Industrial Robots. Mathematical Problems in Engineering, 2015, 1-10. doi:10.1155/2015/931048Rubio, F., Llopis-Albert, C., Valero, F., & Suñer, J. L. (2016). Industrial robot efficient trajectory generation without collision through the evolution of the optimal trajectory. Robotics and Autonomous Systems, 86, 106-112. doi:10.1016/j.robot.2016.09.008Llopis-Albert, C., Valero, F., Mata, V., Pulloquinga, J. L., Zamora-Ortiz, P., & Escarabajal, R. J. (2020). Optimal Reconfiguration of a Parallel Robot for Forward Singularities Avoidance in Rehabilitation Therapies. A Comparison via Different Optimization Methods. Sustainability, 12(14), 5803. doi:10.3390/su12145803Llopis-Albert, C., Valero, F., Mata, V., Escarabajal, R. J., Zamora-Ortiz, P., & Pulloquinga, J. L. (2020). Optimal Reconfiguration of a Limited Parallel Robot for Forward Singularities Avoidance. Multidisciplinary Journal for Education, Social and Technological Sciences, 7(1), 113. doi:10.4995/muse.2020.13352Yang, J., Su, H., Li, Z., Ao, D., & Song, R. (2016). Adaptive control with a fuzzy tuner for cable-based rehabilitation robot. International Journal of Control, Automation and Systems, 14(3), 865-875. doi:10.1007/s12555-015-0049-4Zhang, G., & Zhang, X. (2016). Concise adaptive fuzzy control of nonlinearly parameterized and periodically time-varying systems via small gain theory. International Journal of Control, Automation and Systems, 14(4), 893-905. doi:10.1007/s12555-015-0054-7SUTONO, S. B., ABDUL-RASHID, S. H., AOYAMA, H., & TAHA, Z. (2016). Fuzzy-based Taguchi method for multi-response optimization of product form design in Kansei engineering: a case study on car form design. Journal of Advanced Mechanical Design, Systems, and Manufacturing, 10(9), JAMDSM0108-JAMDSM0108. doi:10.1299/jamdsm.2016jamdsm0108DUBEY, A. K. (2009). Performance Optimization Control of ECH using Fuzzy Inference Application. Journal of Advanced Mechanical Design, Systems, and Manufacturing, 3(1), 22-34. doi:10.1299/jamdsm.3.22Zhang, H., Fang, H., Zhang, D., Luo, X., & Zou, Q. (2020). Adaptive Fuzzy Sliding Mode Control for a 3-DOF Parallel Manipulator with Parameters Uncertainties. Complexity, 2020, 1-16. doi:10.1155/2020/2565316Markazi, A. H. D., Maadani, M., Zabihifar, S. H., & Doost-Mohammadi, N. (2018). Adaptive Fuzzy Sliding Mode Control of Under-actuated Nonlinear Systems. International Journal of Automation and Computing, 15(3), 364-376. doi:10.1007/s11633-017-1108-5Truong, H. V. A., Tran, D. T., To, X. D., Ahn, K. K., & Jin, M. (2019). Adaptive Fuzzy Backstepping Sliding Mode Control for a 3-DOF Hydraulic Manipulator with Nonlinear Disturbance Observer for Large Payload Variation. Applied Sciences, 9(16), 3290. doi:10.3390/app9163290Li, T.-H. S., & Huang, Y.-C. (2010). MIMO adaptive fuzzy terminal sliding-mode controller for robotic manipulators. Information Sciences, 180(23), 4641-4660. doi:10.1016/j.ins.2010.08.00

Design of Adaptive Sliding Mode Fuzzy Control for Robot Manipulator Based on Extended Kalman Filter

In this work, a new adaptive motion control scheme for robust performance control of robot manipulators is presented. The proposed scheme is designed by combining the fuzzy logic control with the sliding mode control based on extended Kalman filter. Fuzzy logic controllers have been used successfully in many applications and were shown to be superior to the classical controllers for some nonlinear systems. Sliding mode control is a powerful approach for controlling nonlinear and uncertain systems. It is a robust control method and can be applied in the presence of model uncertainties and parameter disturbances, provided that the bounds of these uncertainties and disturbances are known. We have designed a new adaptive Sliding Mode Fuzzy Control (SMFC) method that requires only position measurements. These measurements and the input torques are used in an extended Kalman filter (EKF) to estimate the inertial parameters of the full nonlinear robot model as well as the joint positions and velocities. These estimates are used by the SMFC to generate the input torques. The combination of the EKF and the SMFC is shown to result in a stable adaptive control scheme called trajectory-tracking adaptive robot with extended Kalman (TAREK) method. The theory behind TAREK method provides clear guidelines on the selection of the design parameters for the controller. The proposed controller is applied to a two-link robot manipulator. Computer simulations show the robust performance of the proposed scheme

Design and Development of a Twisted String Exoskeleton Robot for the Upper Limb

High-intensity and task-specific upper-limb treatment of active, highly repetitive movements are the effective approaches for patients with motor disorders. However, with the severe shortage of medical service in the United States and the fact that post-stroke survivors can continue to incur significant financial costs, patients often choose not to return to the hospital or clinic for complete recovery. Therefore, robot-assisted therapy can be considered as an alternative rehabilitation approach because the similar or better results as the patients who receive intensive conventional therapy offered by professional physicians.;The primary objective of this study was to design and fabricate an effective mobile assistive robotic system that can provide stroke patients shoulder and elbow assistance. To reduce the size of actuators and to minimize the weight that needs to be carried by users, two sets of dual twisted-string actuators, each with 7 strands (1 neutral and 6 effective) were used to extend/contract the adopted strings to drive the rotational movements of shoulder and elbow joints through a Bowden cable mechanism. Furthermore, movements of non-disabled people were captured as templates of training trajectories to provide effective rehabilitation.;The specific aims of this study included the development of a two-degree-of-freedom prototype for the elbow and shoulder joints, an adaptive robust control algorithm with cross-coupling dynamics that can compensate for both nonlinear factors of the system and asynchronization between individual actuators as well as an approach for extracting the reference trajectories for the assistive robotic from non-disabled people based on Microsoft Kinect sensor and Dynamic time warping algorithm. Finally, the data acquisition and control system of the robot was implemented by Intel Galileo and XILINX FPGA embedded system

Robotic arm joint position control using iterative learning and mixed sensitivity H? robust controller

This paper proposes an improved control strategy of a robotic arm joint using hybrid controller consist of H∞ robust controller and iterative learning controller. The main advantage of this controller is the simple structure that made it possible to be implemented on a small embedded system for frugal innovation in industrial robotic arm development. Although it has a simple structure, it is a robust H∞ controller that has robust stability and robust performance. The iterative learning controller makes the trajectory tracking even better. To test the effectiveness of the proposed method, computer simulations using Matlab and hardware experiments were conducted. Variation of load was applied to both of the processes to present the uncertainties. The superiority of the proposed controller over the proportional integral derivative (PID) controller that usually being used in a low-cost robotic arm development is confirmed that it has better trajectory tracking. The error tracking along the slope of sinusoidal trajectory input was suppressed to zero. The biggest error along the trajectory that happened on every peak of the sinusoidal input, or when the direction is changed has been improved from 15 degrees to 4 degrees. This can be conceived that the proposed controller can be applied to control a low-cost robotic arm joint position which is applicable for small industries or educational purpose

Control of the interaction of a gantry robot end effector with the environment by the adaptive behaviour of its joint drive actuators

The thesis examines a way in which the performance of the robot electric actuators can be precisely and accurately force controlled where there is a need for maintaining a stable specified contact force with an external environment. It describes the advantages of the proposed research, which eliminates the need for any external sensors and solely depends on the precise torque control of electric motors. The aim of the research is thus the development of a software based control system and then a proposal for possible inclusion of this control philosophy in existing range of automated manufacturing techniques.The primary aim of the research is to introduce force controlled behaviour in the electric actuators when the robot interacts with the environment, by measuring and controlling the contact forces between them. A software control system is developed and implemented on a robot gantry manipulator to follow two dimensional contours without the explicit geometrical knowledge of those contours. The torque signatures from the electric actuators are monitored and maintained within a desired force band. The secondary aim is the optimal design of the software controller structure. Experiments are performed and the mathematical model is validated against conventional Proportional Integral Derivative (PID) control. Fuzzy control is introduced in the software architecture to incorporate a sophisticated control. Investigation is carried out with the combination of PID and Fuzzy logic which depend on the geometrical complexity of the external environment to achieve the expected results