2 Degree of Freedom Robotic Leg

Professor Xing, an assistant professor at Cal Poly, proposed the 2 DOF Robotic Leg project for this quarter’s senior project class. The project is to build a robotic leg attached at the hip to a stand, which will be used as a teaching tool and eventually help develop Cal Poly’s very own robotic quadruped. Since this project has multiple uses after its completion, there are multiple customers that it must perform well for: the Cal Poly Mechanical Engineering (ME) Department, the ME Lab instructors, and the students. The Scope of Work (Sections 2 & 3) is composed of 2 main sections: Background and Objectives. The Background covers all research regarding similar products and dynamic systems while the Objectives outline the problem statement and the team’s objectives required to complete this project. The following sections are comprised Team Capy’s process of achieving those objectives throughout the yearlong project. This is described in detail and broken into the following sections: Concept Design, Final Design, Manufacturing plan, Design Verification Plan, Project Management, and Conclusion. This project’s scope has significantly changed throughout the year, resulting in a very iterative design process that led to excellent results. This document details every step of that process, leading to the development of the final design and its manufacturing process

Rapid prototyping using a precision robotic manipulator

A rapid prototyping system using a precision robotic manipulator has been developed. The system is comprised of a latest personal computer (Pentium II, 300 MHz, 128 MB RAM and 5 GB hard disk capacity), interfacing system (PS-23 indexer, KS-drives and servomotors), a four degrees of freedom precision manipulator and a ball nosed end milling equipment. The hardware is integrated with the AutoSurf (CAD software), which is used in designing engineering models, section cut the surface models and changing graphic file into DXF files (neutral format files). The AutoLISP (AutoSurf programming language) has been used to simulate the additive prototyping process. The hardware is also linked with the self-developed CAM programs for data processing and motion control. With the above hardware and software configuration, subtractive prototyping models have been produced successfully. Simple additive prototyping process was also simulated graphically in AutoSurf environment. The CAM programs were also tested to be fine with the additive prototyping models’ data files. Generally, the rapid prototyping system using the precision robotic manipulator has the advantage of being cheaper, effective, time and space saving, with dual purposes (subtractive and additive processes) and it is an all in one system

Introduction to an Efficient Process for Automatic Offline Pro-gram Generation for a Robotic Spot Welding Assembly Line.

One of the most important applications of industrial robots is spot welding which is used in high production applications mostly in automotive industries where mass production is required. The speed, precision, efficiency and the resulting cost reduction due to mass production are well accepted and well documented advantages of automation of spot welding process using robots. In order to meet the new challenges of increased global competition, manufacturers are forced to seek new technologies for improved production and cost reduction. Such cost cutting efforts can only be achieved by improving the offline programming method. Offline programming is one of the most crucial parts of modern automotive manufacturing process. In this Master’s thesis a process was developed for faster and efficient offline programming of industrial manipulators in spot welding application. The thesis work has been conducted in Visual Components Oy, Espoo, Finland. In traditional practice there are lots of manual steps involved in the robotic spot welding area. The whole process design of the robotic spot welding is not simple and includes CAD design of the part, shape and complexity of the parts which needs to be spot weld, design of the robot work cell, design and selection of spot weld gun, required production rate, offline programming tool, robot calibration, work cell calibration, work piece positioner design etc. In this report an approach to implement the offline programming of robot based on simulation software with the process knowledge of car-body in white was proposed and partially developed. Some common problems such as motion simulation, collision detection and calibration can be partly solved by this approach. The thesis consisted of a theoretical section to investigate the current state of art of offline programming tools and methods and a practical section to develop working prototype for demonstration. The implementation of the prototype used the application programmer’s interface (API) available with the simulation software. A prototype was developed to propose an efficient process for putting the whole spot welding process starting for CAD design, work cell setup, offline programming and calibration in a closed loop

Off-line robot programming framework

Comunicação apresentada na International Conference on Autonomic and Autonomous Systems and International Conference on Networking and Services (ICAS'05 and ICNS'05), Papeete, Tahiti, French Polynesia, 23-28 October 2005.The industrial robot programming is a work for specialist in robotics. Today, this work is very hard because there are many robot manufacturers with different languages and different programming environments. Although, off-line programming is an way that can reduce drastically the machines stop time to maintenance. With the use of object oriented design patterns, it is possible minimize the time spent in robot programming. In this work is proposed a off-line programming environment. This tool is based in one abstract model to program robots, encapsulate in java classes. This way has the main advantage of best source code utilization. Grouping the business classes in modules by functionalities, we can reduce complexity between low matching. Recognized patterns like Facade and Template Method will construct the base to develop this programming framework. The programming robot languages tested in this work was Rapid, Karel and Melfa Basic IV, respectively languages used by ABB, Fanuc and Mitsubishi constructors.Master Industrial Electronic Engineering - Project Supported by the Programme ALBAN, the European Union Programme of High Level Scholarships for Latin America, scholarships no. E04M033540BR. CIMATEC - Technology and Manufactory Integrated Center of SENAI-BA, Brazil

Additive manufacturing using robotic manipulators, FDM, and aerosol jet printers.

Additive manufacturing has created countless new opportunities for fabrication of devices in the past few years. Advances in additive manufacturing continue to change the way that many devices are fabricated by simplifying processes and often lowering cost. Fused deposition modeling (FDM) is the most common form of 3D printing. It is a well-developed process that can print various plastic materials into three-dimensional structures. This technology is used in a lot of industries for rapid prototyping and sometimes small batch manufacturing. It is very inexpensive, and a prototype can be created in a few hours, rather than days. This is useful for testing dimensions of designs without wasting time and money. Recently, a new form of additive manufacturing was developed known as aerosol jet printing (AJP). This process uses a specially developed ink with a low viscosity to print a wide range of metals and polymers. These printers work by atomizing the ink into a mist that is pushed out of a nozzle into a focused beam. This beam deposits material on the substrate at a standoff distance of 3-5 mm. Since this is a non-contact printing process, many non-planar surfaces can be printed on quite easily. AJP also offers very small feature sizes as low as 30 µm. It is useful for printing conductive traces and printing on unique surfaces. These printed traces often need some form of post processing to fully cure the ink and remove any solvent. For metals such as silver, this post processing removes solvent, increases conductivity, and increases adhesion. Methods for post processing include using an oven, intense pulse light (IPL), or a laser that follows the traces as they are printed. Of these methods, the IPL offers the greatest flexibility because it can cure a larger area than the laser and only takes a few seconds compared to hours in an oven. In this thesis, these two types of additive manufacturing processes, FDM and AJP, are explored, developed, and integrated with robotic manipulators in a custom system called the “Nexus”. By integrating these processes with robotic manipulators, these processes can be automated and combined to create unique processes and streamlined fabrication. The third chapter covers the development of the AJP printing and curing processes and integration with the Nexus system as well as some example devices such as a strain gauge. The fourth chapter goes over how a custom FDM module was integrated into the Nexus system and how material extrusion is synchronized with the motion component. Finally, in the second part of the fourth chapter, an FDM 3D printer is designed and fabricated as an end effector for a 6DOF robotic arm to be used in the Nexus system. To control these processes, G-Code is used to tell the machines the correct path to take. Methods for generating 5-axis G-Code are suggested to enable non-planar printing in the future

Enhanced online programming for industrial robots

The use of robots and automation levels in the industrial sector is expected to grow, and is driven by the on-going need for lower costs and enhanced productivity. The manufacturing industry continues to seek ways of realizing enhanced production, and the programming of articulated production robots has been identified as a major area for improvement. However, realizing this automation level increase requires capable programming and control technologies. Many industries employ offline-programming which operates within a manually controlled and specific work environment. This is especially true within the high-volume automotive industry, particularly in high-speed assembly and component handling. For small-batch manufacturing and small to medium-sized enterprises, online programming continues to play an important role, but the complexity of programming remains a major obstacle for automation using industrial robots. Scenarios that rely on manual data input based on real world obstructions require that entire production systems cease for significant time periods while data is being manipulated, leading to financial losses. The application of simulation tools generate discrete portions of the total robot trajectories, while requiring manual inputs to link paths associated with different activities. Human input is also required to correct inaccuracies and errors resulting from unknowns and falsehoods in the environment. This study developed a new supported online robot programming approach, which is implemented as a robot control program. By applying online and offline programming in addition to appropriate manual robot control techniques, disadvantages such as manual pre-processing times and production downtimes have been either reduced or completely eliminated. The industrial requirements were evaluated considering modern manufacturing aspects. A cell-based Voronoi generation algorithm within a probabilistic world model has been introduced, together with a trajectory planner and an appropriate human machine interface. The robot programs so achieved are comparable to manually programmed robot programs and the results for a Mitsubishi RV-2AJ five-axis industrial robot are presented. Automated workspace analysis techniques and trajectory smoothing are used to accomplish this. The new robot control program considers the working production environment as a single and complete workspace. Non-productive time is required, but unlike previously reported approaches, this is achieved automatically and in a timely manner. As such, the actual cell-learning time is minimal

A unified robotic kinematic simulation interface.

Robotic controller and application programming have evolved along with the application of computer technologies. A PC-based, open architecture controller, off-line programming and simulation system integrated in one-box solution presents the latest advancement in robotics. Open architecture controllers have been proven essential for all aspects of reconfiguration in future manufacturing systems. A Unified Reconfigurable Open Control Architecture (UROCA) research project is under way within the Intelligent Manufacturing Systems (IMS) Centre at the University of Windsor. Applications are for industrial robotic, CNC, and automotive control systems. The UROCA proposed architecture is a reconfigurable system that takes the advantages of different control structure types, thereby integrating them in a way to enhance the controller architecture design. This research develops a graphical robotic simulation platform by creating an optimized object-oriented design. (Abstract shortened by UMI.) Paper copy at Leddy Library: Theses & Major Papers - Basement, West Bldg. / Call Number: Thesis2005 .D56. Source: Masters Abstracts International, Volume: 44-03, page: 1474. Thesis (M.A.Sc.)--University of Windsor (Canada), 2005

Development of a virtual reality milling machine for knowledge learning and skill training

Current methods of training personnel on high cost machine tools involve the use of both classroom and hands on practical training. The practical training required the operation of costly equipment and the trainee has to be under close personnel supervision. The main aim of this project is to reduce the amount of practical training and its inherent cost, time, danger, personal injury risk and material requirements by utilising a virtual reality technology. In this study, an investigation into the use of Virtual reality for training operators and students to use the Milling Machine was carried out. The investigation has been divided into two sections: first the development of Milling Machine in the 3D virtual environment, where the real machine was re-constructed in the virtual space. This has been carried out by creating objects and assembling them together. The complete Milling machine was then properly modelled and rendered so it could be viewed from all viewpoints. The second section was to add motion to the virtual world. The machine was made of functions as for the real machine. This was achieved by attaching Superscape Control Language (SCL) to the objects. The developed Milling machine allows the users to choose the material, speed and feed rate. Upon activation, the virtual machine will be simulated to carry out the machining process and instantaneous data on the machined part can be generated. The results were satisfactory, the Milling Machine was modelled successfully and the machine was able to perform according to task set. Using the developed Virtual Model, the ability for training students and operators to use the Milling Machine has been achieved

Development of 3D Printable Part Library for Easy to Manufacture Components for Educational and Competitive Robotics

Educational and competitive robotics enable hands on learning and experimentation. Despite cost effective and ease of access of open source micro-controllers, drives and sensors, the structural components and brackets continue to be very expensive. Motivated by the Robotics for Everyone initiative, we are developing many easy-to-manufacture parts that will allow learners to easily 3D print parts for (1) Structural assembly of robot chassis (2) Sensor mounting (3) Electronic control mounting (4) Power supply (5) Various power drives. The ecosystem of the robotic components is developed around extrusion structures and tubular elements and 3D printing is used for building the parts for testing and qualifying. Fixtures for mounting cameras for advanced machine learning and computer vision experiments are provided.Mechanical Engineerin