Control System Development for a Novel Wire-Driven Hyper-Redundant Chain Robot, 3D-Trunk

Abstract

This paper presents the control system for our novel hyper-redundant chain robot system "3D-Trunk" demonstrating an operational principle that is much different from traditional solutions. Its main features are that all the joints are passive, state controllable and share common inputs introduced by wire-driven control. For this unique design, a force-oriented method is employed to control the driving wires. The mechanical analysis, as well as an analysis of the differential driven mechanism of this design is formulated. The design of a novel wire tension state sensing component and its operation are also described. The system is controlled by distributed embedded controllers. The actuators' coordination mechanism and the bang-bang controller-based closed-loop control implementation of this novel prototype are discussed from a mechatronic system level. Thus, this paper, together with a predecessor [1], presents all required details allowing for building and controlling 3D-Trunk.