Robust Cooperative Manipulation without Force/Torque Measurements: Control Design and Experiments
This addresses the problem of precise and reliable multi-robot manipulation in industrial or robotic applications, offering an incremental improvement by eliminating the need for force sensors.
The paper tackles cooperative manipulation of an object by multiple robots without force/torque measurements, proposing two decentralized control methods that ensure robust performance and avoid singularities, with experimental validation using two robotic arms.
This paper presents two novel control methodologies for the cooperative manipulation of an object by N robotic agents. Firstly, we design an adaptive control protocol which employs quaternion feedback for the object orientation to avoid potential representation singularities. Secondly, we propose a control protocol that guarantees predefined transient and steady-state performance for the object trajectory. Both methodologies are decentralized, since the agents calculate their own signals without communicating with each other, as well as robust to external disturbances and model uncertainties. Moreover, we consider that the grasping points are rigid, and avoid the need for force/torque measurements. Load distribution is also included via a grasp matrix pseudo-inverse to account for potential differences in the agents' power capabilities. Finally, simulation and experimental results with two robotic arms verify the theoretical findings.