Self-Balancing Free Flying 3D Underactuated Robot for zero-g Object Capture

Abstract

This project is aimed at studying, designing and realizing an anthropomorphic robot with a free oating base. The goal is to control the robot aimed at reaching every position of his working space minimizing one generalized displacement relating to one of the degrees of freedom of the robot base without any thruster action. The innovative aspect is that the experiment is performed in a 3D dimensional space at zero-g using a robot which has a oating base. The base is characterized by inertia and mass of the same order of the robotic arm. This peculiarity produces a considerable dynamic coupling and possible failure of conventional manipulator control law. The challenge is to compensate the arm movements without using thrusters. The paper reports results of simulations and data obtained on parabolic igh t experiments illustrating the experimental test-bed. This work presents progresses and results obtained by means of a free-ying space robot prototype developed for space extra vehicular activity (EVA) and for space servicing missions.