Design and development of a redundant modular multipurpose agricultural manipulator

Abstract

These days, agricultural work still involves demanding and exhausting duties. The application of autonomous robots is a possible way to support human labor in the field. By adapting the robots to several tasks, like harvesting or cultivation of different types of crop, costs can be reduced while the flexibility of the system is increased. Thus, in this paper several concepts of modular agricultural manipulators for sweet-pepper, apples, and grapes are presented and discussed. In order to achieve dexterous manipulation and to be able to avoid obstacles, redundant robots are investigated. Kinematic as well as dynamic simulation models are applied for system design and evaluation. Finally, the developed manipulator and first control results are introduced. Both, simulations and measurements, demonstrate the principal suitability of the system.