AN EXPERIMENTAL APPROACH TO IMPROVING THE JOINT STIFFNESS OF INDUSTRIAL ROBOTS THROUGH DEXTEROUS POSTURE IDENTIFICATION

Improving a robot’s posture enables it to perform with greater accuracy and repeatability. A stiffer posture also protects the robot from unnecessary vibrations and deflections that may be induced by an applied load. This paper presents a method for choosing high stiffness robot postures. The method is demonstrated on a six-degree-of-freedom Fanuc M10-iA serial manipulator. The posture identification and stiffness modelling were achieved by a reliable and cost-effective alternative to deflection measurement using IEPE accelerometers.