Theory and Implementation of Dual-Arm Manipulation Planning
Kensuke Harada
Abstract— In this paper, we study theory and implementationissues of dual-arm manipulation planning. We mainly discusson three topics: (1) static geometrical approach on planningthe position/orientation an object placed at the designated parton the environment, (2) pick-and-place planning of a dual-arm manipulator where the planner automatically determineswhether both arms have to be used simultaneously or notaccording to the context, and (3) implementation issues ofdual-arm manipulation where manipulation planning can beperformed within a reasonable time. The effectiveness will beverified through several experimental results.
I. INTRODUCTION
In factory environments, dual-arm manipulators are widelyused since they are expected to realize complex tasks in-cluding object manipulation[1], [2]. The paper addressessome topics existing in the dual-arm manipulation planningproblem.
We firstly discuss the static geometrical approach on objectplacement planner[3] where the planner automatically deter-mines the pose of an object that is stably placed near a user-assigned point on the environment surface. In this method,the polygon models of both the object and the environmentare clustered, with each cluster being approximated by aplanar region.
We secondly discuss the pick-and-place motion planner[4]where the planner automatically determines whether botharms have to be used simultaneously or not according tothe context. We can consider several types of re-grasping bya dual-arm manipulator such as 1) re-grasping between theright and left hands, 2) once placing an object by using theright or left hand and then re-grasping it by using the rightor left hand, and 3) once placing an object by using bothhands and then re-grasping it by using both hands, etc. Byutilizing a special topological structure in the manipulationspace that can be captured into a manipulation graph, themanipulation problem is solved by searching a manipulationgraph.
We thirdly consider the problem solving the pick-and-place planning within a reasonable time. We consider a casewhere the shape complexity of the fixture highly restrictsthe posture of a robot placing an object to the fixture. Inour method, we consider simultaneously generating threepostures of the robot: 1) picking up an object, 2) regraspingan object from the right hand to the left hand, and 3) placingan object to the fixture. Our planning algorithm effectivelyutilizes multiple threads and reduces the size of the searchspace.
Kensuke Harada is with Intelligent Systems Research Institute, NationalInstitute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST), Tsukuba,[email protected]
II. OBJECT PLACEMENT PLANNER
Our object placement planner is composed of an offlineand an online phases. In the offline phase, we find planarclusters on both the object and the environment surfaces byclustering the polygon model. We then consider assigningsome properties such asContacting Cluster andConvexityto each cluster. In the online phase, to check whether or not aplanar cluster of an object can enter in contact with a planarcluster of an environment, we first introduce two testingmethods (Convexity Test and Contact Test). ConvexityTest is introduced for run-time efficiency of the onlinesearching method. By checking the convexity/concavity re-lation between the object and the environment,ConvexityTest considers reducing the number of candidate clusterswhere the collision is checked between the object and theenvironment. Then,Contact Test checks collision betweenthe object and the environment for given position/orientationof the object placed on the environment. After both testingmethods are passed, we furthermore check whether or notthe object can keep the gravitational equilibrium placed onthe environment surface (Stability Test).
Fig. 1. Example of object pose obtained by using the object placementplanner
III. DUAL-ARM MANIPULATION PLANNER
Fig.2 shows the manipulation space used to plan a ma-nipulation task. LetCSr, CSl and CSo be the configura-
Fig. 2. The manipulation space gathers the three configuration spaces ofthe object, the left arm and the right arm respectively.
Initial robot pose
Initial
object place
Intermediate
object place
Target
object place
Transit Transit
Tra
nsi
t
CGr
CP
U CGr
CP
U U
CGl CP
U
CGl
Final robot pose
Ty
pe
2
Ty
pe
2
Ty
pe
2
Ty
pe
2
CGr
U
CGl
Transit Transit
Transit Transit
Fig. 3. Graph structure used in manipulation planning
tion space of the right arm, the left arm and the object,respectively. LetCGr andCGl be the domain inCS wherethe object is stably grasped by the right arm and the leftarm, respectively. LetCP be the domain inCS where theobject is stably placed on the environment. Each subspacehas the folilation structure according to the stable grasp andthe stable placement.
Based on the manipulation space, the manipulation graphis constructed as shown in Fig. 3. By searching for thismanipulation graph, we can seamlessly generate pick-and-place task including several styles of regrasping as mentionedin the introduction.
IV. IMPLEMENTATION OF DUAL-ARMMANIPULATION
This section especially focuses on the manipulation plan-ning where a dual-arm manipulator first picks up an objectfrom the pile, then regrasps it from the right hand to theleft hand, and finally places it to the fixture. We considersimultaneously generating three postures of the robot: thegrasping posture, the regrasping posture and the placingposture. Among three postures, calculation of the regraspingposture is the most time consuming. Hence, to plan the pick-and-place motion, we have to make the size of candidate
grasping and placing pose as small as possible before search-ing the regrasping posture. Also, the geometrical complexityof the fixture highly restricts the placing posture of a robot,the searching space for finding robot pose becomes large.In this case, we have to solve the inverse kinematics fora number of times during the searching process. Hence,we constructed a function of solving the inverse kinematicsproblem in parallel. LetDGr(obj) be the database of right-hand’s grasping posture for the object namedobj. For givenpose of an objectPo, let the function rightArm.parallelIK(Po, DBr(obj)) output the subset ofDGr(obj) where theinverse kinematics problem is solvable. LetPoi andPof bethe initial and the target pose of the object. When regraspingan object, we consider selecting an object pose from theset DP (obj). The pseudo code of our planning problembecomes as follows:Algorithm 1 (Calculation of Robot Postures)
1: DG′r(obj)← rightArm.parallelIK(Poi, DGr(obj))
2: DG′′r (obj)← rightArm.checkCollision(Poi, DG′
r(obj))3: DG′
l(obj)← leftArm.parallelIK(Pof , DGl(obj))4: DG′′
l (obj)← leftArm.checkCollision(Pof , DG′l(obj))
5: for i← 1 : DG′′r (obj).size()
6: for j ← 1 : DG′′l (obj).size()
7: DP ′(obj)← rightArm.parallelIK(DP (obj), DG′′r (obj)[i])
8: DP ′′(obj)← leftArm.parallelIK(DP ′(obj), DG′′l (obj)[j])
9: for k ← 1 : DP ′′(obj).size()10: if not rightArm.IK(DP ′′(obj)[k], DG′′
r (obj)[i]), continue
11: if rightArm.Colliding(DP ′′(obj)[k], DG′′r (obj)[i]), continue
12: if not leftArm.IK(DP ′′(obj)[k], DG′′l (obj)[j]), continue
13: if leftArm.Colliding(DP ′′(obj)[k], DG′′l (obj)[j]), continue
14: returnDP ′′(obj)[k], DB′′r (obj)[i], DB′′
l (obj)[j]15: end16: end17: endFig. 4 shows an experimental result where a dual-arm
manipulator first picks up an object from the pile, regraspsit from the right to the left hand, and places it to the fixtureby using the left hand.
REFERENCES
[1] “New Generation Robot”,Yaskawa Technical Review, vol. 72, no. 2,2008.
[2] C.Smith et al., “Dual arm manipulation–A survey”, Robotics andAutonomous Systems, vol. 60 pp.1340-1353, 2012.
[3] K. Harada, T. Tsuji, K. Nagata, N. Yamanobe, and H. Onda, “Validat-ing an Object Placement Planner for Robotic Pick-and-Place Tasks”, J.of Robotics and Autonomous Systems, vol. 62, pp. 1463-1477, 2014.
[4] K. Harada, T. Tsuji, and J.-P. Laumond, “A Manipulation MotionPlanner for Dual-Arm Industrial Manipulators”,Proc. of IEEE Int.Conf. on Robotics and Automation, pp. 928-934, 2014.
[5] K. Harada et al., “Project on Development of a Robot Systemfor Random Picking –Grasp/Manipulation Planner for a Dual-armManipulator–”,Proc. of IEEE/SICE Int. Symp. on System Integration,pp. 583-589, 2014.
[6] K. Harada, T. Tsuji, K. Kikuchi, K. Nagata, H. Onda, and Y. Kawai,“Planning a Sequence of Pick-and-Place Tasks using Dual-arm MobileManipulators”,IEEE/RSJ Int. Conf. on Intelligent Robots and Systems,2015. (submission)
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(e) (f)
Fig. 4. An example of planned grasping motion
