Dynamics and experiments of a tendon-actuated flexible robotic arm for capturing a floating target

Reusable and flexible capturing of space debris is highly required in future aerospace technologies. A tendon-actuated flexible robotic arm is therefore proposed for capturing floating targets in this paper. Firstly, an accurate dynamic model of the flexible robotic arm is established by using the absolute nodal coordinate formulation (ANCF) in the framework of the arbitrary Lagrangian-Eulerian (ALE) description and the natural coordinate formulation (NCF). The contact and self-contact dynamics of the flexible robotic arm when bending and grasping an object are considered via a fast contact detection approach. Then, the dynamic simulations of the flexible robotic arm for capturing floating targets are carried out to study the influence of the position, size, and mass of the target object on the grasping performance. Finally, a principle prototype of the tendon-actuated flexible robotic arm is manufactured to validate the dynamic model. The corresponding grasping experiments for objects of various shapes are also conducted to illustrate the excellent performance of the flexible robotic arm.