Inertial Parameters Identification of a Humanoid Robot Hanged to a Fix Force Sensor

Abstract

Knowledge of the mass and inertial parameters of a humanoid robot is crucial for the development of model-based controller and motion planning in dynamics situation. Parameters are usually provided from Computer Aided Design (CAD) data and thus inaccurate specially if the robot is modified over time. In this paper, a practical method consisting of hanging a humanoid robot to a fix force sensor to perform its dynamic identification is proposed. This allows, contrary to the literature, to generate very exciting and dynamic motions to identify most of the elements of the inertia tensors in a reduced amount of time. This procedure transforms an instable floating base legged humanoid robot to a safe fix base tree structure robot which makes easier to generate optimal exciting motions. Because of a better excitation the overall trajectory lasts for less than a minute. The method was experimentally validated with a HOAP3 humanoid robot and using a 6-axis force sensor. A reduction of 3 times in average of the RMS difference between measured external reaction forces and moments and their estimates from CAD data was obtained with a single minute of optimal exciting motions.