Dynamic simulation of collaborative robot with physical human-robot interaction

Abstract

Collaborative robots are widely used in collaborative tasks with direct physical interactions with humans and becoming increasingly popular in industrial production lines due to the ability to coordinate with their operators. Existing models of collaborative robots are usually based on robot kinematics, making it difficult to determine the interaction force and ensure operation safety. This dissertation will develop a dynamic model to describe the UR3e manipulator, and then write and test the codes using MATLAB for simulating the inverse dynamics. The robot’s Unified Robot Description Format (URDF) file will be developed from its 3D model to build the Simscape model for simulation and control. Using this Simscape model, this dissertation will perform motion control by providing the manipulator’s joints with polynomial signal. Then the dynamic model will be combined with a controller to control the manipulator model for reaching a target pose. Besides, experiments will be designed to simulate a human-robot interaction situation during a collaborative task by providing different external torque signals to the end effector of the manipulator. The results of the simulations will be noted and analyzed.