Automated Path Planning for Plug & Produce in a Cutting-tool Changing Application

Abstract

In this paper, a path planning algorithm is designed and tested with a real robot for a Plug & Produce demonstrator. The demonstrator is divided into modules that can be connected and removed. Modules are used for various processes like tool change and storage. This paper focuses on the process of cutting-tool change for the production industry. The Plug & Produce demonstrator uses a multi-agent system where parts and resources are agents. A part agent, e.g., a cutting-tool, can request a robot to perform skills like transportation. This requires the robot to be autonomous. The aim of this paper is to automate the path planning for industrial robotics in a Plug & Produce system. This is done by implementing a sampling based RRT algorithm combined with a collision detection function in RobotStudio. With various real time scenarios, the path planning execution time is observed and presented in the paper.