Disassembly Sequence Planning Considering Human-Robot Collaboration

Abstract

Disassembly currently is a labor-intensive process with limited automation. The main reason lies in the fact that disassembly usually has to address model variations from different brands, physical uncertainties resulting from component defects or damage during usage, and incomplete product information. To overcome these challenges and to automate the disassembly process through human-robot collaboration, this paper develops a disassembly sequence planner which distributes the disassembly task between human and robot in a human-robot collaborative setting. This sequence planner targets to address potential issues including distinctive products, variant orientations, and safety constraints of human operators. The proposed disassembly sequence planner identifies the locations and orientations of the to-be-disassembled items, determines the starting point, and generates the optimal dis-assembly sequence while complying with the disassembly rules and considering the safe constraints for human operators. This algorithm is validated by numerical and experimental tests: the robot can successfully locate and disassemble the pieces following the obtained optimal sequence, and complete the task via collaboration with the human operator without violating the constraints.