Implementation of Industrial Robot Force Control Case Study: High Power Stub Grinding and Deburring

In this paper, the results from a joint industry-academia project in industrial robotic force control are presented. The extension and implementation of an external sensor system for an industrial robot system, which can be used for high-bandwidth force control, are described. Results from two industrial applications using the system are presented, a stub grinding application using a new compliant grinding end-effector integrated with the robot control system, and a deburring application with a stiff tool requiring high-bandwidth force control in six degrees of freedom. Using the system an easily reconfigurable control structure was achieved, which was able to control contact forces with a sampling bandwidth of an order of magnitude higher than for conventional robot controllers