Stiffness of serial and quasi-serial manipulators: comparison analysis

Abstract

The paper deals with comparison analysis of serial and quasi-serial manipulators. It shows a difference between stiffness behaviours of corresponding industrial robots under external loading, which is caused by machining process. The analysis is based on the estimation of compliance errors induced by cutting forces that are applied to the manipulator end-effector. We demonstrate that the quasi-seral manipulators are preferable for large-dimensional tasks while the quasi-serial ones better suit small size tasks.