Workspace Scaling and Haptic Feedback for Industrial Telepresence and Teleaction Systems with Heavy-duty Teleoperators

Abstract

The focus of this work was on the deployment of telepresence and teleaction technology for handling heavy parts in industrial realm. To improve the industrial usability of telepresence systems, off-the-shelf components have been utilized, in particular due to their low construction and maintenance costs. Two of the challenges resulting out of utilizing such components were studied and analyzed in this work and several solutions were developed. The first challenge appears when the haptic device and the industrial robot are kinematically different. Several kinematic mapping and workspace scaling techniques have been developed and successfully implemented. The second challenge is the provision of haptic feedback in telepresence systems with heavy-duty teleoperators. A model-based force feedback has been developed to ensure stability of the system with high levels of transparency. In order to evaluate the developed techniques, two main psychophysical experiments have been designed and conducted. Furthermore, the work was accomplished by examining the operational and economic feasibility of the developed system.