Reliable assembly of products using an impedance controlled manipulator

This paper describes the development of a robotic assembly system for assembling consumer products in the food and personal care industry. Most commercially available manipulators are equipped with PID motion controllers which are suited for pick-and-place operations. Here we considered assembly of products under conditions of geometric deviations, a task for which PID controllers are less suited. The feasibility of such assembly tasks was investigated using an industrial manipulator provided with an impedance controller. Results indicate that a proper set of product related impedances enables the system to cope with relatively large positioning errors, resulting in more reliable assembly