Learning hybrid force and position control of robot manipulators

The learning control is applied to hybrid force and position control of robot manipulators. When the geometry and position of a constraint surface is known, the hybrid force and position controller and the feedforward compensator can be designed in the constraint coordinates. When the operation is periodic, the learning hybrid force and position control enhance the control performance as the feedforward compensator is updated in each cycle by the force and position error in the preceding trials. This scheme is proved to be asymptotically stable. A two degree of freedom SCARA-type direct-drive robot manipulator is used to test the learning hybrid force and position control. The deburring tool mounted on the upper link of the robot could follow a flat, tilted flat, and curved ¼" aluminum plate with a desired contact force of 10 N (within the root-mean-square force error of 1.95 N) and with a desired tangential velocity. The experiments confirmed the effectiveness of the learning hybrid force and position controller