The Educational Robotic Cell with the ABB IRB 140 Industrial Robot

Tato diplomová práce se zabývá návrhem a realizací výukového pracoviště pro výuku ovládání, online/offline programování průmyslových robotů ABB, s řízením IRC5. Práce je zaměřena na konstrukci pracoviště, a to jak po stránce strojní, tak i elektro konstrukce. V rámci práce bylo mimo jiného navrženo několik efektorů a pomůcek pro výuku, i další možnosti rozvoje pracoviště. Práce je dále zaměřena na návrh způsobu výuky a vytvoření studijních materiálů.Master thesis deals with the design and realization of vocational training robotic cell for online / offline programing training and teaching on IRB140 industrial robot with IRC5 control system. Thesis is focused on the mechanical design and wiring as well. In the course of the work, several effectors and tools for teaching were proposed, as well as other possibilities of robotic cell development. The work also deals with the design of teaching methods and the creation of study materials.354 - Katedra robotikyvýborn

The Construction Design of Effector for Placing of Cardboard Leading

Import 23/07/2015Bakalářské práce je zaměřena na konstrukci efektoru pro pokládání kartonových prokladů. V teoretické části je popsána teorie efektorů a principů vakuové techniky, v praktické jsou pak řešeny tři možné konstrukce. Jedna z těchto konstrukcí byla vybrána jako optimální a tou se práce zabývá dále.The bachelor thesis is focused on a construction design of effector for placing of cardboard leading. An introductory part acquaints us with effector and vacuum technology issues. Three different constructions were created from which was subsequently selected one optimal. Furthermore, the work deals with optimal construction.354 - Katedra robotikyvýborn

Manipulator accuracy improvement

Předkládaná disertační práce se zabývá možnostmi zvyšování přesnosti šestiosých angulárních manipulátorů s ohledem na vlastnosti jejich mechanické struktury. Práce popisuje postupy a dosažené výsledky dvou řešených výzkumných oblastí. V úvodu této práce jsou popsány příčiny vzniku nepřesností u průmyslových manipulátorů, norma, která se zabývá měřením klíčových provozních parametrů, inženýrské i vědecké postupy pro detekci nepřesnosti a případnou kompenzaci. Rovněž jsou popsány vhodné systémy pro měření přesnosti robotů. Dále jsou stanoveny cíle práce, tyto vycházejí z tezí disertační práce a konkrétních výzkumných úkolů, které byly a jsou na katedře robotiky řešeny. Vlastní práce je dělena do kapitol dle řešených témat. První výzkumnou oblastí je zkoumání vlivu směru přiblížení na dosažitelnou opakovatelnost. V rámci tohoto výzkumu byl za pomocí víceosých akcelerometrů a vysokorychlostního DIC kamerového systému zkoumán vliv směru přiblížení do měřeného bodu, na dosažitelnou opakovatelnost, byly realizované experimenty, jejichž cílem bylo tento vliv potvrdit a zároveň vyloučit ovlivnění zjištěných výsledků dalšími vlivy jako je kupříkladu drift, konkrétní pozice, hmotnost neseného objektu manipulace, rychlost přiblížení či vliv konkrétního robotu. Experimenty prováděné pro potřeby tohoto výzkumu byly realizovány na dvou robotech ABB IRB1200 5/09. V rámci následného výzkumu v oblasti zvyšování přesnosti manipulátorů byla experimentálně zjišťována míra vlivu změny teploty ramene robotu na dosahovanou opakovatelnost. Pro potřeby tohoto výzkumu byla dvojice robotu ABB IRB1200 5/09 a robot UR10e osazen aparaturou pro snímání aktuální teploty a rovněž bylo připraveno jednoúčelové měřicí hnízdo s konfokálním a liniovými senzory pro víceosé měření. Cílem je navržení postupu pro kompenzaci driftu, při znalosti aktuální teploty ramene robotu. V závěru práce lze nalézt zhodnocení dosažených výsledků.The presented thesis deals with the possibilities of increasing the precision of six-axis angular manipulators with respect to the properties of its mechanical structure. The paper describes the procedures and the achieved results of the two proposed research areas. The introduction of this thesis describes the causes of errors of industrial robots. A standard that defines the measurement of a key operating parameters, engineering and scientific procedures for error detection and possible compensation as well as suitable systems for measuring the precision of robots is also described. Furthermore, the aims of the work are set, these are based on a specific research task that have been and are being solved at the Department of Robotics. The work itself is divided into chapters according to the topics addressed The first research area is the research of the influence of the approach direction on the achievable repeatability. In the framework of this research, the influence of the approach direction on the measured target, on the achievable repeatability was investigated using multi-axis accelerometers and a high-speed DIC camera system. Several experiments were performed to confirm this influence and at the same time to exclude the influence of the obtained results by other influences such as specific position, weight of the carried object of manipulation, approach speed or influence of a specific robot. Experiments performed for this research were performed on two ABB IRB1200 5/09 robots. As part of the subsequent research in the field of increase of the accuracy of manipulators, the degree of influence of the change in the temperature of the robot arm on the achievable repeatability was experimentally determined. For the needs of this research, a pair of ABB IRB1200 5/09 robots and a UR10e robot were equipped with temperature sensing equipment for on-line measurement and a single-purpose measuring nest with confocal and two laser profilers for multi-axis measurements was also prepared. The aim is to propose a procedure for drift compensation, based on the current temperature of the robot arm. At the conclusion of this paper, you can find an evaluation of the results.354 - Katedra robotikyvyhově

TESTING OF GLUED JOINTS ON PLASTIC PARTS MANUFACTURED USING FFF TECHNOLOGY

The article focuses on the testing of glued joints of plastic parts manufactured by 3D rapid prototyping, using the Fused Filament Fabrication technology. The first part of the article describes the suitability of using a glued joint. Then follows a brief description of the plastic materials used for the manufacturing of the testing samples. The materials include not only the common types, such as Polylactide, Polyethylene Terephthalate, Acrylonitrile Butadiene Styrene, but also Thermoplastic Polyurethane, which has a high elasticity and is usually described as a flexible material. The main section of the article deals with the testing of glued joints on a tensometric machine, which produces stress-strain curves. The shear strength of the joints is evaluated. For each material, multiple samples are prepared with different orientation of individual layers created by the 3D printing process. The impact of the orientation of the layers on the resulting strength of the glued joint is also evaluated. The final section of the article presents comparison and evaluation of the results –analyses of cracks, the impact of the orientation of the layers and the impact of individual materials. The experiment proved the independence of the orientation of the layers on the strength of the glued joint. It was also found out during the experiment that the use of a common adhesive on a flexible material was unsuitable

The use of the two-handed collaborative robot in non-collaborative application

The article deals with possibilities of using of a two-handed collaborative robot in automated production. The introductory part of this paper is about robot manufacturers' proposed ways of use of collaborative robots and a consideration of correctness of this stance. In this matter, an alternative point of view is proposed and tested, where a collaborative robot does not cooperate with a worker but replaces him/her completely. The main part of the study focuses on a specific installation of the YuMi collaborative robot into an already existing production line of a leading Czech supplier in the automotive industry. This real application is verified in simulations with an alternative solution consisting of two traditional industrial robots ABB IRB 120 instead. These data are evaluated and the advantages of deploying the collaborative robot and the industrial robots in the specific assembly application are compared. Economic return and productivity in high production cycle applications are considered. The article then describes the difficulties caused by the low load capacity of the YuMi collaborative robot and an alternative approach using the FEM methodology and topology optimization in the robot grip jaws design.Web of Science60215715

Improved mutual understanding for human-robot collaboration: Combining human-aware motion planning with haptic feedback devices for communicating planned trajectory

In a collaborative scenario, the communication between humans and robots is a fundamental aspect to achieve good efficiency and ergonomics in the task execution. A lot of research has been made related to enabling a robot system to understand and predict human behaviour, allowing the robot to adapt its motion to avoid collisions with human workers. Assuming the production task has a high degree of variability, the robot's movements can be difficult to predict, leading to a feeling of anxiety in the worker when the robot changes its trajectory and approaches since the worker has no information about the planned movement of the robot. Additionally, without information about the robot's movement, the human worker cannot effectively plan own activity without forcing the robot to constantly replan its movement. We propose a novel approach to communicating the robot's intentions to a human worker. The improvement to the collaboration is presented by introducing haptic feedback devices, whose task is to notify the human worker about the currently planned robot's trajectory and changes in its status. In order to verify the effectiveness of the developed human-machine interface in the conditions of a shared collaborative workspace, a user study was designed and conducted among 16 participants, whose objective was to accurately recognise the goal position of the robot during its movement. Data collected during the experiment included both objective and subjective parameters. Statistically significant results of the experiment indicated that all the participants could improve their task completion time by over 45% and generally were more subjectively satisfied when completing the task with equipped haptic feedback devices. The results also suggest the usefulness of the developed notification system since it improved users' awareness about the motion plan of the robot.Web of Science2111art. no. 367

Structural optimization method of a FinRay finger for the best wrapping of object

Soft gripping, in which the gripper adapts to differently shaped objects, is in great demand for use in unknown or dynamically changing environments and is one of the main research subjects in soft robotics. Several systems have already been created, one of which is a passive shape-adaptable finger based on the FinRay effect. The geometric shape of this finger ensures that the finger wraps around the object it grips. FinRay fingers have been studied in several studies, which have changed the internal structure and examined how gripping force's dependence on finger deformation changes. So far, however, no specific way has been determined to evaluate the proposed finger regarding its ability to wrap around the object. This work comes up with a new and simple method to evaluate the finger's wrapping around the object mathematically. Based on this evaluation method, several different patterns of the internal structure of FinRay fingers were tested. The fingers were first tested in a simulation program, which simulated a steel roller indentation with a diameter of 20 mm in the middle of the finger's contact surface. Based on the simulation results, selected types of structure were made by the Fused Filament Fabrication method from a flexible filament and tested on a real test rig to verify the results of the simulation and compare it with the real behaviour. According to the methodology used, the results show that the most suitable structure of the selected tested fingers from the point of view of wrapping the finger around the object is a structure without internal filling. Designers can simply use the new evaluation method to compare their designed finger variants and select the most suitable one according to the ability to wrap around the gripped object. They can also use graphs from this work's results and determine the finger's dimensions without internal filling according to the required forces and deflection.Web of Science119art. no. 385

Camera arrangement optimization for workspace monitoring in human-robot collaboration

Human-robot interaction is becoming an integral part of practice. There is a greater emphasis on safety in workplaces where a robot may bump into a worker. In practice, there are solutions that control the robot based on the potential energy in a collision or a robot re-planning the straight-line trajectory. However, a sensor system must be designed to detect obstacles across the human-robot shared workspace. So far, there is no procedure that engineers can follow in practice to deploy sensors ideally. We come up with the idea of classifying the space as an importance index, which determines what part of the workspace sensors should sense to ensure ideal obstacle sensing. Then, the ideal camera positions can be automatically found according to this classified map. Based on the experiment, the coverage of the important volume by the calculated camera position in the workspace was found to be on average 37% greater compared to a camera placed intuitively by test subjects. Using two cameras at the workplace, the calculated positions were 27% more effective than the subjects' camera positions. Furthermore, for three cameras, the calculated positions were 13% better than the subjects' camera positions, with a total coverage of more than 99% of the classified map.Web of Science231art. no. 29

Influence of drift on robot repeatability and its compensation

This paper presents an approach to compensate for the effect of thermal expansion on the structure of an industrial robot and thus to reduce the repeatability difference of the robot in cold and warm conditions. In contrast to previous research in this area that deals with absolute accuracy, this article is focused on determining achievable repeatability. To unify and to increase the robot repeatability, the measurements with highly accurate sensors were performed under different conditions on an industrial robot ABB IRB1200, which was equipped with thermal sensors, mounted on a pre-defined position around joints. The performed measurements allowed to implement a temperature-based prediction model of the end effector positioning error. Subsequent tests have shown that the implemented model used for the error compensation proved to be highly effective. Using the methodology presented in this article, the impact of drift can be reduced by up to 89.9%. A robot upgraded with a compensation principle described in this article does not have to be warmed up as it works with the same low repeatability error in the entire range of the achievable temperatures.Web of Science1122art. no. 1081

Influence of the Approach Direction on the Repeatability of an Industrial Robot

The article aims to prove the hypothesis, that an approach direction influences repeatability at target point of a trajectory. Unlike most researches that deal with absolute accuracy, this paper is focused on determining the achievable repeatability and the influence of the direction of approach on it. To prove the hypothesis, several measurements are performed under different conditions, on industrial robot ABB IRB1200. To verify and confirm the result obtained from the resolvers located on the individual axes of the robot, the measurements are replicated using high-speed digital image correlation cameras. Using an external measuring device, the real repeatability of the robot endpoint is determined. The measurement proved the correctness of the hypothesis, i.e., the dependence of the approach direction on repeatability was proved. Furthermore, real deviations were measured and the extent of this influence on the robot repeatability was determined