A high-performance multi-arm environment: path planning and practical implementation

Abstract

This paper reports on the development of a working multi-arm robotic system at the Queen's University of Belfast (QUB). The practical implementation of the system involves motion coordination of two multi-joint RTX robots with six degrees-of-freedom, interfaced through transputers to a host SPARC-IPC workstation. A path-planning scheme is introduced to provide accurate and coordinated collision-free motion. In addition, taking into account the need for high productivity in industrial environments, minimum-time movements are imposed by increasing the manipulators'performance to a maximum, thus providing a high-performance workcell. A real-time case study and its implementation is included to show the validity and efficiency of the system.

Keywords

Multi-arm application modelling path planning robots

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