Experiments towards automated sewing with a multi-robot system

In this paper a concept for automated multi-robot-aided sewing is presented. The objective of the work is to demonstrate automatic sewing of 3D-shaped covers for recliners, by assembling two different hide parts with different shapes, using two robots to align the parts during sewing. The system consists of an industrial sewing machine and two real-time controlled Universal Robots 6-axis industrial manipulators. A force feedback system combined with optical edge sensors is evaluated for the control of the sewing process. The force sensors are used to synchronize the velocity and feed rate between the robots and the sewing machine. A test cell was built to determine the feasibility of the force feedback control and velocity synchronization. Experiments are presented which investigate the ability of the robot to feed a hide part into the sewing machine using a force sensor and different strategies for velocity synchronization.