Automated Assembly with a Robotics Manipulator/Hand System

本研究探讨了机械手在自动化机器人装配中的应用。在许多装配中，配合部件之间允许的间隙小于与机器人装配单元相关的不确定性，尽管可以通过使用专用机构和高精度夹具来减少这些不确定性，但这限制了灵活性并增加了成本。在装配配合操作的执行过程中，机械臂最好采用力/扭矩反馈，以减少由于不确定性而导致的零件对中误差。通过在机械手系统中加入机械手，装配单元的性能将得到提高。力/扭矩测量的准确性将通过在机械手和手上同时安装传感器而得到提高。这只手既可以作为一般的固定装置，使被抓取的零件在装配过程中能够被刚性地握住，又可以作为微型机械手，对被抓取的零件的位置进行微调。该项目的中心目标是一种综合力/扭矩引导运动策略的通用和自动化方法，该方法在机械手/手系统上运行，能够减少装配执行过程中不确定性引起的误差。//

This research investigates the use of robotic hands in automated robotic assembly. In many assemblies, the clearances allowed between mating parts are smaller than the uncertainties associated with a robotic assembly cell and though it is possible to reduce these uncertainties by using special purpose mechanisms and high precision fixturing devices, this limits flexibility and increases cost. It is preferable for the manipulator to use force/torque feedback during the execution of assembly mating operations to reduce alignment errors between parts which are caused by the uncertainties. By incorporating a robotic hand into the robot manipulator system, the performance of the assembly cell will be improved. The accuracy of force/torque measurements will be increased by putting sensors on both the manipulator and the hand. The hand will serve as both a general fixturing device so that the grasped part can be held rigidly during assembly and a micromanipulator so that fine adjustments to the position of the grasped part can be made. The central goal of this project is a general and automated method for synthesizing force/torque guided motion strategies which operate on a manipulator/hand system and are capable of reducing uncertainty-induced errors during assembly execution. //