Kinematic Estimator for Flexible Links in Parallel Robots

Abstract

Control of flexible link parallel manipulators is still an open area of research. The flexibility and deformations of the limbs make the estimation of the Tool Center Point (TCP) position a non-trivial area, being one of the main challenges on this type of robots. In the literature different approaches to estimate this deformation and determine the location of the TCP have been proposed. However, most of these approaches require the use of high computational cost integration methods or expensive measurement systems. This work presents a novel approach which can not only estimate precisely the deformation of the flexible links (less than 3% error), but also its derivatives (less than 4% error). The validity of the developed estimator is tested in a Delta Robot, resulting in less than 0.025% error in the estimation of the TCP position in comparison with the results obtained with ADAMS Multibody software.