Guidance and control of a planar robot manipulator used in an assembly line

Abstract

Robot manipulators have been successfully utilized in assembly lines within the last few decades. In order to increase productivity and diminish costs, they have been enrolled at several stages of automation, including transportation, welding, mounting and quality control processes of the components that are assembled to construct the entire system. In this study, an unusual method is proposed to make the robot manipulators and moving belts serve accordingly in an efficient manner. To this extent, the motion of a two-link robot manipulator is planned in a continuous fashion by the use of a proper guidance law compatible with the uninterrupted movement of the moving belt upon which the components are placed by means of the manipulator. For this purpose, a control system is built for the manipulator based on its dynamic modelling by regarding the PI (proportional plus integral) control law in accordance with the linear homing guidance law. Moreover, engagement geometry is constructed. Having performed computer simulations, it is observed that the tip point of the manipulator can catch the slot on the belt at speeds from 0.5 to 2.5 m/s for different initial positions and speeds of the tip point from 5.0×10−5 to 0.5 m/s.