Modeling and control of a robot manipulator

This thesis presents work completed on the design of the modelling and path planning components for a robot manipulator mounted on a mobile platform. This platform is for use in the mining safety inspections of the mine roof, i.e., the hanging wall. Currently this process is done by mine workers and it places them at risk of falling of unstable rocks from the roof. A geometric based inverse kinematics algorithm for a 5 DOF redundant manipulator is proposed and implemented on a Packbot510i used as a test platform. Three versions of the Rapidly-exploring Random Trees planning algorithm namely, basic RRT, RRT Ball and RRT_ are compared. Results obtained show that RRT_ is more suitable than RRT and RRT Ball in terms of the length and the consistency of the trajectories produced. A Force Angle stability measure is used to guide the robot arm into trajectories that prevent the robotic system from tipping over. Results show that the Force Angle stable measure is more cautious, i.e., it classifies trajectories close to the instability of the system as unstable. Simulation results provided show that this system is capable of carrying out the safety inspections of the roof in the mining environment. Experimental results show that a few modifications are required for the system to be used practically on the test platform due to issues experienced with the hardware.

Grantor dc:publisher.institution

Department of Electrical Engineering

Year dc:date.issued

2013

Author dc:creator

• Makondo, Ndivhuwo

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Braae, Martin

Language dc:language.iso

eng

Handle dc:identifier.uri

http://hdl.handle.net/11427/11817

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:open.uct.ac.za:11427/11817