Design and Experiment of an Underactuated Broccoli-Picking Manipulator

Mature broccoli has large flower balls and thick stems. Therefore, manual picking is laborious energy-consuming. However, the big spheroid vegetable-picking manipulator a complex structure poor enveloping effect easily causes mechanical damage. ball-picking with compact simple control system was designed. The smart in stable configuration when enveloped balls. First, physical damage test carried out on according to underactuated manipulator’s design scheme. maximum surface pressure of ball 30 N, cutting force stem 35 N. Then, kinematic analysis completed, statical model mechanism established. dimension for each connecting rod determined based results requirements. sizes were 50 cm, 90 60 65 cm. calculated required thrust as 598.66–702.88 simulated verify its reliability manipulator. Finally, motion track, speed, motor speed advance laboratory environment. One-hundred tests mature 135–185 mm diameter. Results showed that had an 84% success rate 100% lossless rate. fastest single harvest time stand 11.37 s robot arm 3.4 m/s, stepper r/min.