Open Access Open Access  Restricted Access Subscription Access

Cost-Effective Manipulator Arms for Fukushima-Type Rescue Robots and Bomb Disposal

Mark Haley, Kenzo Nonami, Wenwei Yu, Jose Gonzalez

Abstract


The goal of this research is to design cost-effective manipulator arms which can be used for Fukushima-type rescue robots which precisely place sensors or open doors. Current manipulator arms can cost over $150,000 and these high prices are impeding development of robotic systems for a wide range of applications.  Lower cost systems would expedite the development of a new class of robots which could assist during nuclear power plant disasters or they could be used to cut wires or to neutralize improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs) during Explosive Ordnance Disposal (EOD) operations by military or police bomb squads. This project integrates both navigation and control of manipulator arms on autonomous Unmanned Ground Vehicles (UGVs) which use SLAM thereby reducing the required Degrees of Freedom (DOF) for the robotics arms.   Also a human-like manipulator hand which is tele-operated using an Electromyography (EMG) interface provides an easy-to-use backup if the autonomous systems failed.

Full Text:

PDF

References


F. Pierrot, E. Dombre, E. D´egoulange, L. Urbain, P. Caron, S. Boudet,J. Gari´epy, and J. Megnien, “Hippocrate: a safe robot arm for medical applications with force feedback,” Medical Image Analysis, vol. 3, no. 3, pp. 285–300, 1999.

E. Dombre, G. Duchemin, P. Poignet, and F. Pierrot, “Dermarob: a safe robot for reconstructive surgery”, IEEE Transactions on Robotics and Automation, vol. 19, no. 5, pp. 876–884, 2003.

Morgan Quigley, Alan Asbeck, and Andrew Y. Ng, Dept. of Computer Science, Stanford University “A Low-cost Compliant 7-DOF Robotic Manipulator”, Robotics and Automation (ICRA), 20111 IEEE International Conference, May 9-13, 2011, Conference Publication, pages 6051-6058.

NASA -http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/multimedia/gallery/iss031e070790.html

Barrett Technology, Inc., “WAM Arm,” 2012. http://www.barrett.com/robot/products-arm-specifications.htm

Invenscience ARM , http://www.robotshop.com/ca/productinfo.aspx?pc=RB-Ins-04〈=en-US

KUKA youbot Arm, http://youbot-store.com/category/53-youbots.aspx

Robots Using ROS: RE2's Advanced Mobile Manipulators, DARPA ARM Robot, Robotics Engineering Excellence (re2, Inc.), has developed Manipulators systems which use the Barrett Arm and cost in excess of $100,000. http://www.ros.org/news/2010/11/robots-using-ros-re2s-advanced-mobile-manipulators.html

Wenwei Yu, Daisuke Nishikawa, Yasuhiro Ishikawa, Hiroshi Yokoi, and Yukinori Kakazu, Multi-functional electrical prosthetic hand ―Development of tendon-driven mechanism and controller, Journal of Robotics & Mechatronics, Vol. 14, No.6, pp. 324-331, 2002

Daisuke NISHIKAWA, Wenwei, YU, Hiroshi YOKOI, and Yukinori KAKAZU, On-Line Supervising Mechanism for Learning Data in Surface Electromyogram Motion Classifiers, Journal of Electronics and Communications in Japan, Vol. 33, No. 14, pp. 2634-2643, 2002

Jose Gonzalez, Hirokazu Soma, Masashi Sekine, Wenwei Yu, Psycho-physiological Assessment of a Prosthetic Hand Sensory Feedback System base on an Auditory Display: A Preliminary Study, Journal of Neuro-Engineering and Rehabilitation, accepted

Jose González, Yuse Horiuchi, Wenwei Yu, Classification of Upper Limb Motions from Around-Shoulder Muscle Activities for Hand Biofeedback, the special issue on Data mining techniques in Medical Informatics in Open Access Medical Informatics Journal, Open Med Inform J. 2010(4), pp. 74–80, 2010




DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.21535%2FProICIUS.2012.v8.806

Refbacks

  • There are currently no refbacks.