Bilateral control of master-slave manipulators for ideal kinesthetic coupling

In bilateral control, the operator is coupled with the object at the remote site through the master-slave system and he can feel the object through his kinesthesia. The ideal kinesthetic coupling can be regarded as when the operator can manipulate the system as if he were manipulating the object directly. The authors previously discussed Yoshikawa and Yokokohji (1988) and Yokokohji and Yoshikawa (1989) one degree-of-freedom (DOF) systems in order to achieve this ideal state. In this paper, the discussion is extended into multiple DOF case. First, the ideal responses of master-slave systems are defined. Secondly, new control schemes are proposed for different configuration and for isomorphic configuration arms, respectively. Thirdly, the validity of the proposed control schemes are confirmed by simulations. Lastly, design guide of master and slave arms is discussed in the viewpoint of maneuverability