Cartesian Control of Robotic Manipulators with Joint Compliance

An efficient on-line scheme for computing the inverse joint solution of robotic manipulators is combined with an improved formulation of robust, nonlinear feedback control in joint space to produce a realizable Cartesian control scheme. Parametric uncertainties in the robot model are highlighted by the inclusion of compliance at each joint. Simulation results for a two link, coupled manipulator demonstrate that this Cartesian control enables the tip of the arm to track the demanded trajectory with arbitrarily small error in response to realistic actuator torques.