Abstract

This paper presents the wrench capability analysis, the controller design, and experimental results of an aerial robot flying gripper. This robot uses four quadrotors to actuate four fingers such as to grasp and manipulate large size objects. The yaw motion of each quadrotor is used to open/close one of the four fingers. A method is proposed to analyze its manipulability considering inequality constraints such as the propellers’ capabilities and equality constraints such as the yaw torque applied by each quadrotor to open or close a finger and the equilibrium conditions of passive joints. This allows concluding on the full manipulability of the robot and evaluating its force and torque capabilities. A dynamic control allocation algorithm is implemented to distribute the control effort among all quadrotors while guaranteeing an achievable solution satisfying the aforementioned constraints. A proof of concept is realized and allows presenting preliminary experimental results of the flying gripper.

References

1.
Zhang
,
H.
,
Sun
,
J.
, and
Zhao
,
J.
,
2019
, “
Compliant Bistable Gripper for Aerial Perching and Grasping
,”
Proceedings of IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA)
,
Montreal, Canada
,
May 20–24
, pp.
1248
1253
.
2.
Tognon
,
M.
,
Yüksel
,
B.
,
Buondonno
,
G.
, and
Franchi
,
A.
,
2017
, “
Dynamic Decentralized Control for Protocentric Aerial Manipulators
,”
Proceedings of IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA)
,
Marina Bay Sands, Singapore
,
May 29–June 3
, pp.
6375
6380
.
3.
Kamel
,
M.
,
Alexis
,
K.
, and
Siegwart
,
R.
,
2016
, “
Design and Modeling of Dexterous Aerial Manipulator
,”
Proceedings of IEEE International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS)
,
Daejeon, South Korea
,
Oct. 9–14
, pp.
4870
4876
.
4.
Yu
,
P.
,
Wang
,
Z.
, and
Wong
,
K.
,
2019
, “
Exploring Aerial Perching and Grasping With Dual Symmetric Manipulators and Compliant End-Effectors
,”
Int. J. Micro Air Veh.
,
11
(
1
), p. 175682931987741.
5.
Sreenath
,
K.
, and
Kumar
,
V.
,
2013
, “
Dynamics, Control and Planning for Cooperative Manipulation of Payloads Suspended by Cables From Multiple Quadrotor Robots
,”
Proceedings of Robotics: Science and Systems Foundation
,
Berlin, Germany
,
June 24–28
.
6.
Sanalitro
,
D.
,
Savino
,
H. J.
,
Tognon
,
M.
,
Cortés
,
J.
, and
Franchi
,
A.
,
2020
, “
Full-Pose Manipulation Control of a Cable-Suspended Load With Multiple UAVs Under Uncertainties
,”
IEEE Robot. Autom. Lett.
,
5
(
2
), pp.
2185
2191
.
7.
Nguyen
,
H.-N.
,
Park
,
S.
,
Park
,
J.
, and
Lee
,
D.
,
2018
, “
A Novel Robotic Platform for Aerial Manipulation Using Quadrotors as Rotating Thrust Generators
,”
IEEE Trans. Rob.
,
34
(
2
), pp.
353
369
.
8.
Six
,
D.
,
Briot
,
S.
,
Chriette
,
A.
, and
Martinet
,
P.
,
2018
, “
The Kinematics, Dynamics and Control of a Flying Parallel Robot With Three Quadrotors
,”
IEEE Robot. Autom. Lett.
,
3
(
1
), pp.
559
566
.
9.
Gioioso
,
G.
,
Franchi
,
A.
,
Salvietti
,
G.
,
Scheggi
,
S.
, and
Prattichizzo
,
D.
,
2014
, “
The Flying Hand: A Formation of UAVs for Cooperative Aerial Tele-Manipulation
,”
Proceedings of IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA)
, Hong Kong, China,
May 31–June 5
, pp.
4335
4341
.
10.
Saldana
,
D.
,
Gabrich
,
B.
,
Whitzer
,
M.
,
Prorok
,
A.
,
Campos
,
M. F.
,
Yim
,
M.
, and
Kumar
,
V.
,
2017
, “
A Decentralized Algorithm for Assembling Structures With Modular Robots
,”
Proceedings of IEEE International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS)
,
Vancouver
, Canada,
Sept. 24–28
, pp.
2736
2743
.
11.
Zhao
,
M.
,
Kawasaki
,
K.
,
Anzai
,
T.
,
Chen
,
X.
,
Noda
,
S.
,
Shi
,
F.
,
Okada
,
K.
, and
Inaba
,
M.
,
2018
, “
Transformable Multirotor With Two-Dimensional Multilinks: Modeling, Control, and Whole-Body Aerial Manipulation
,”
Int. J. Robot. Res.
,
37
(
9
), pp.
1085
1112
.
12.
Korpela
,
C.
,
Orsag
,
M.
, and
Oh
,
P.
,
2014
, “
Towards Valve Turning Using a Dual-aArm Aerial Manipulator
,”
Proceedings of IEEE International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS)
,
Chicago, IL
,
Sept. 14–18
, pp.
3411
3416
.
13.
Car
,
M.
,
Ivanovic
,
A.
,
Orsag
,
M.
, and
Bogdan
,
S.
,
2018
, “
Impedance Based Force Control for Aerial Robot Peg-in-Hole Insertion Tasks
,”
Proceedings of IEEE International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS)
,
Madrid, Spain
,
Oct. 1–5
, pp.
6734
6739
.
14.
Saint-Sevin
,
M.
,
Bégoc
,
V.
,
Briot
,
S.
,
Chriette
,
A.
, and
Fantoni
,
I.
,
2019
, “
Design and Optimization of a Multi-Drone Robot for Grasping and Manipulation of Large Size Objects
,”
ROMANSY 22—Robot Design, Dynamics and Control
,
Rennes, France
,
June 25–28
,
Springer International Publishing
, pp.
458
465
.
15.
Li
,
Z.
,
Song
,
X.
,
Bégoc
,
V.
,
Chriette
,
A.
, and
Fantoni
,
I.
,
2021
, “
Dynamic Modeling and Controller Design of a Novel Aerial Grasping Robot
,”
ROMANSY 23—Robot Design, Dynamics and Control
,
Sapporo, Japan
,
Sept. 20–24, 2020
,
Springer International Publishing
, pp.
538
546
.
16.
Birglen
,
L.
,
Laliberté
,
T.
, and
Gosselin
,
C.
,
2008
,
Underactuated Robotic Hands
,
Springer
,
Berlin
.
17.
Ebert-Uphoff
,
I.
, and
Voglewede
,
P. A.
,
2004
, “
On the Connections Between Cable-Driven Robots, Parallel Manipulators and Grasping
,”
Proceedings of IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA)
,
New Orleans, LA
,
Apr. 26–May 1
, pp.
4521
4526
.
18.
Ryll
,
M.
,
Bicego
,
D.
,
Giurato
,
M.
,
Lovera
,
M.
, and
Franchi
,
A.
,
2020
, Fast-Hex—A Morphing Hexarotor: Design, Mechanical Implementation, Control and Experimental Validation, preprint, https://arxiv.org/abs/2004.06612, Accessed May 17, 2020.
19.
Sarkisov
,
Y. S.
,
Kim
,
M. J.
,
Bicego
,
D.
,
Tsetserukou
,
D.
,
Ott
,
C.
,
Franchi
,
A.
, and
Kondak
,
K.
,
2019
, “
Development of Sam: Cable-Suspended Aerial Manipulator
,”
2019 International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA)
,
Montreal, Canada
,
May 20–24
, pp.
5323
5329
.
20.
Jamshidifar
,
H.
, and
Khajepour
,
A.
,
2020
, “
Static Workspace Optimization of Aerial Cable Towed Robots With Land-Fixed Winches
,”
IEEE Trans. Robot.
,
36
(
5
), pp.
1603
1610
.
21.
Erskine
,
J.
,
Chriette
,
A.
, and
Caro
,
S.
,
2019
, “
Wrench Analysis of Cable-Suspended Parallel Robots Actuated by Quadrotor Unmanned Aerial Vehicles
,”
J. Mech. Robot.
,
11
(
2
), p.
020909
.
22.
Li
,
Z.
,
Erskine
,
J.
,
Caro
,
S.
, and
Chriette
,
A.
,
2020
, “
Design and Control of a Variable Aerial Cable Towed System
,”
IEEE Robot. Autom. Lett.
,
5
(
2
), pp.
636
643
.
23.
Härkegård
,
O.
,
2004
, “
Dynamic Control Allocation Using Constrained Quadratic Programming
,”
J. Guidance Control Dyn.
,
27
(
6
), pp.
1028
1034
.
24.
Wang
,
H.
,
Yi
,
J.
, and
Fan
,
G.
,
2009
, “
Flight Control System Design With Hierarchy-Structured Dynamic Inversion and Dynamic Control Allocation
,”
2009 IEEE International Conference on Systems, Man and Cybernetics
,
San Antonio, TX
,
Oct. 11–14
, pp.
5162
5167
.
25.
Raoufat
,
M. E.
,
Tomsovic
,
K.
, and
Djouadi
,
S. M.
,
2017
, “
Dynamic Control Allocation for Damping of Inter-area Oscillations
,”
IEEE Trans. Power Syst.
,
32
(
6
), pp.
4894
4903
.
26.
Krut
,
S.
,
Bégoc
,
V.
,
Dombre
,
E.
, and
Pierrot
,
F.
,
2010
, “
Extension of the Form-Closure Property to Underactuated Hands
,”
IEEE Trans. Robot.
,
26
(
5
), pp.
853
866
.
27.
Li
,
Z.
,
2021
, “
Theoretical Developments and Experimental Evaluation of a Novel Collaborative Multi-drones Grasping and Manipulation System of Large Objects
,” Ph.D. thesis,
École centrale de Nantes
,
Nantes
.
28.
Mahony
,
R.
,
Kumar
,
V.
, and
Corke
,
P.
,
2012
, “
Multirotor Aerial Vehicles: Modeling, Estimation, and Control of Quadrotor
,”
IEEE Robot. Autom. Mag.
,
19
(
3
), pp.
20
32
.
29.
Herceg
,
M.
,
Kvasnica
,
M.
,
Jones
,
C.
, and
Morari
,
M.
,
2013
, “
Multi-Parametric Toolbox 3.0
,”
Proceedings of the European Control Conference (ECC)
,
Zurich, Switzerland
,
July 17–19
, pp.
502
510
.
30.
Fukuda
,
K.
,
2020
, “Polyhedral Computation,” , Accessed January 21, 2021.
31.
Meier
,
L.
,
Honegger
,
D.
, and
Pollefeys
,
M.
,
2015
, “
Px4: A Node-Based Multithreaded Open Source Robotics Framework for Deeply Embedded Platforms
,”
Proceedings of IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation (ICRA)
,
Seattle, WA
,
May 25–30
, pp.
6235
6240
.
32.
Grünbaum
,
B.
,
2003
,
Convex Polytopes
,
Springer-Verlag
,
New York
.
You do not currently have access to this content.