Torque-Controlled Lightweight Arms and Articulated Hands: Do We Reach Technological Limits Now?

Abstract

In this paper we briefly address DLR’s (German Aerospace Center) background in space robotics by hand of corresponding milestone projects including systems on the International Space Station. We then discuss the key technologies needed for the development of an artificial “robonaut” generation with mechatronic ultra-lightweight arms and multifingered hands. The third arm generation is nearly finished now, approaching the limits of what is technologically achievable today with respect to light weight and power losses. In a similar way DLR’s second generation of artificial four-fingered hands was a big step towards higher reliability, manipulability and overall performance.

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Albu-Schäffer, A., and Hirzinger, G. 2000. State feedback controller for flexible joint robots: A globally stable approach implemented on DLR’s lightweight robots . Proceedings of the IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS), Takamatsu, Japan.

Albu-Schäffer, A., and Hirzinger, G. 2001. Parameter identification and passivity based joint control for a 7DoF torque controlled lightweight robot . Proceedings of the ICRA International Conference on Robotics and Automation, Seoul, Korea, May 21-26, pp. 2852–2858 .

Albu-Schäffer, A., and Hirzinger, G. 2002. Cartesian impedance control techniques for torque controlled lightweight robots . Proceedings of the IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA), Washington DC, pp. 657–663 .

Bluethmann, M., Ambrose, R., Askew, R., Goza, M., Lovechik, C., Magruder, D., Differ, M. A., Rehnmark, F. 2001. Robonaut: a robotic astronaut’s assistant . Proceedings of the 10th International Conference on Advanced Robotics (ICAR), Budapest, Hungary.

Borst, Ch., Fischer, M., and Hirzinger, G. 2002. Calculating hand configurations for precision and pinch grasps . Proceedings of the IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS), EPFL, Lausanne, Switzerland, pp. 1553–1559 .

Haidacher, S., and Hirzinger, G. 2002. Contact point identifi-cation in multi-fingered grasps exploiting kinematic constraints . Proceedings of the IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA), Washington, DC, pp. 1597–1603 .

Hirzinger, G., Brunner, B., Dietrich, J., and Heindl, J. 1994. ROTEX: the first remotely controlled robot in space . Proceedings of the IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation, San Diego, CA, May 8–13.

Hirzinger, G., Butterfaß, J., Fischer, M., Grebenstein, M., Hähnle, M., Liu, H., Schaefer, I., and Sporer, N. 2000. A mechatronic approach to the design of lightweight arms and multifingered hands . Proceedings of the IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA), San Francisco, CA.

Hirzinger, G., Albu-Schäffer, A., Hähnle, M., Schaefer, I., and Sporer, N. 2001a. On a new generation of torque controlled lightweight robots . Proceedings of the ICRA International Conference on Robotics and Automation, Seoul, Korea, May 21–26, pp. 3356–3363 .

10.

Hirzinger, G., Brunner, B., Landzettel, K., Schaefer, I., Sporer, N., Butterfaß, G., and Schedl, M. 2001b. Space robotics -DLR’s telerobotic concepts, lightweight arms and articulated hands . Proceedings of the 10th International Conference on Advanced Robotics (ICAR), Budapest, Hungary.

11.

Koeppe, R., Albu-Schaeffer, A., Preusche, C., Schreiber, G., and Hirzinger, G. 2001. A new generation of compliance controlled manipulators with human arm like properties . Proceedings of the 10th International Symposium of Robotics Research (ISRR), Lorne, Victoria, Australia, November 9–12.