Robust Position Tracking Control for Rigid-Link Flexible-Joint Robots Constrained to a Surface

Abstract

This paper presents an approach for designing a robust position tracking controller for rigid-link flexible-tint (RLFJ) robot manipulator constrained to a surface. The methodology uses force control concepts that were developed for rigid link robots operating on a constrained surface and extends them to include the effects of mechanical actuator dynamics. To illustrate this approach, we develop a robust tracking controller that achieves global uniform ultimate boundedness (GUUB) stability of the link position tracking error. The controller accomplishes this while maintaining bounded end-effector surface forces in spite of model uncertainty and the presence of unknown bounded disturbances.