Accuracy enhancements of industrial robots through close-range photogrammetry

工业机器人具有高度的可重复性。一旦手动示教了机器人末端执行器的姿势，机器人末端执行器就可以一次又一次地移动到该姿势，位置误差通常小于0.050 mm。然而，工业机器人的精度相对较差。如果机器人的末端执行器被要求移动到预先计算的姿势(如在脱机编程中)，其位置误差可能达到几毫米。幸运的是，一种被称为机器人校准的技术可以提高工业机器人的精度。经过校准的工业机器人已经被用于许多航空航天应用，如去毛刺、抛光、钻孔和紧固。然而，仍然需要降低机器人校准的成本和进一步提高机器人的精度，这可以通过开发更有效的校准技术和使用负担得起但适应良好的计量设备来实现。

Industrial robots are highly repeatable. Once the pose of a robot's end-effector has been manually taught, the robot end-effector can move to that pose over and over again with a position error that is typically smaller than 0.050 mm. However, the accuracy of industrial robots is relatively poor. If the robot's end-effector is required to move to a pre-calculated pose (as in offline programming), its position error may reach a couple of millimetres. Fortunately, a technique known as robot calibration allows improving the accuracy of industrial robots. Calibrated industrial robots are already being used in many aerospace applications such as deburring, polishing, drilling, and fastening. However, there is still a need for reducing the cost of robot calibration and for further improving the accuracy of robots, which can be done through developing more effective calibration techniques and using affordable but well-adapted metrology equipment.