The development of an autonomous space robot operation testbed: ASROT

Abstract

We have developed a two-dimensional operation testbed for an autonomous free-flying space robot such as an orbital manoeuvring vehicle. This system has been named ASROT (autonomous space robot operation testbed). Basically, ASROT consists of a satellite robot, a target, a host computer, and a planar base. The host computer is used only for observation and data gathering of the system. The satellite robot is a satellite which can accomplish various tasks with a manipulator. The satellite is 620 mm (W) x 805 mm (H) x 620 mm (L), and weighs 120 kg. This system floats on a planar base using air pads, and is able to fly around using thrusters for position control and a control moment gyro for attitude control. The manipulator is a 1.4 m long flexible arm. This paper proposes an operating system needed for real-time autonomous control. The satellite robot contains hardware systems such as vision systems, board computers, and image processing units, and software systems such as algorithms for path planning.