Basic laboratory experiments with an educational robotic arm

Abstract

This work addresses design and construction issues of a laboratory robotic arm for educational purposes. First of all, the robotic arm performance analysis has been accomplished using Matlab / Simulink / SimMechanics. The obtained knowledge has been utilized to develop the suitable algorithms for analyzing the robotic arm kinematics. Once the SimMechanics model is successfully determined, a real-time xPC target system is used in order to connect the real laboratory robotic arm with the corresponding Matlab / Simulink block diagram. It is important to remark that the developed robotic arm is a convenient tool for learning robotics at any favorable technical university laboratory. On the other hand, the manipulator has six degrees of freedom. Three degrees of freedom correspond to the robotic arm and the rest belongs to the gripper. Moreover, the necessary electronic modules have been developed in order to allow a successful standard communication with the available laboratory devices.