Toward a Plug-and-Work Reconfigurable Cobot

Reconfigurable Mechatronic Robotic Plug-and-Play Controller

In today’s manufacturing community, flexible manufacturing systems (FMS) are becoming important. There is a global trend towards flexible manufacturing systems with an increasing number of countries competing for a share of the world market. FMS are increasingly required for companies to meet the demand for high quality, reasonably priced products. FMS allow a manufacturer to quickly change pro...

Cobot architecture

We describe a new robot architecture: the collaborative robot, or cobot. Cobots are intended for direct physical interaction with a human operator. The cobot can create smooth, strong virtual surfaces and other haptic effects within a shared human/cobot workspace. The kinematic properties of cobots differ markedly from those of robots. Most significantly, cobots have only one mechanical degree ...

Cobot control

Cobots are a class of mechanically passive robotic devices, intended for direct physical collaboration with a human operator. The operator supplies all motive power while the cobot enforces software-defined guiding surfaces, or constraints. Cobots are intrinsically passive, safe devices. This is because, rather than employ powered actuators to produce constraint forces, cobots use “steerable” n...

“Plug & Produce” Functions for an Easily Reconfigurable Robotic Assembly Cell

A General Framework for Cobot Control

A general framework is presented for the design and analysis of cobot controllers. Cobots are inherently passive robots intended for direct collaborative work with a human operator. While a human applies forces and moments, the controller guides motion by tuning the cobot’s set of continuously variable transmissions. In this paper, a path-following controller is developed that steers the cobot ...