Temporal and spatial sensor fusion in a robotic manufacturing workcell

Discusses the problem of using visual and other sensors in the manipulation of a part by a robotic manipulator in a manufacturing workcell. The authors´ emphasis is on the part localization problem involved. The authors introduce a new sensor-fusion approach which fuses sensory information from different sensors at various spatial and temporal scales. Relative spatial information obtained from processing of visual information is mapped to absolute taskspace of the robot through fusing of information from an encoder. Data obtained this way can be superimposed upon data obtained from displacement based vision algorithms at coarser time scales to improve overall reliability. Tracking plans reflecting sensor fusion are proposed. The localization of a part by spatial sensor fusion is experimentally demonstrated to be able to give required fast and accurate part localization