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U.S. Department of Energy
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Optimal positioning of redundant manipulator-platform systems for maximum task efficiency

Conference ·
OSTI ID:6924264

Mobile manipulators are attracting significant interest in the industrial, military and public service communities because of the potential they provide for increased efficiency in material handling and manipulation tasks. Corresponding interest has arisen in the robotic research community since the combination and coordination of the mobility of an autonomous platform with the robotic motion of a manipulator introduce complex problems. This paper focuses on a subset of these problems, namely the utilization of the redundancy occurring in most mobile manipulators to optimize their initial positioning and configuration in the accomplishment of given tasks. Optimization schemes are developed for cases when force and position constraints are applied at the end-effector. Various optimization criteria are investigated for optimizing the position of the platform and the configuration of the manipulator with respect to obstacle avoidance, maneuverability and several torque functions. Sample results are presented for a system involving a three-link manipulator on a mobile platform. The various optimization schemes are discussed and compared, and several directions including multi-criteria optimization, tunneling algorithms, and minimax optimization are outlined for further extensions of the methods to the general problem of optimal positioning and configuring of redundant robotic systems with combined mobility and manipulation capabilities. 12 refs.

Research Organization:
Oak Ridge National Lab., TN (USA)
Sponsoring Organization:
DOD; DOE/ER
DOE Contract Number:
AC05-84OR21400
OSTI ID:
6924264
Report Number(s):
CONF-900780-3; ON: DE90011061
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English