ARFLEX development |
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| The
project’s ambitious aim is to produce a step
change in the industrial robot design
philosophy with respect to the state of the art. |
| ARFLEX
will further develop some of the main novel research paths explored by the
most advanced projects. |
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As an
example, in the field of vision, despite a few European projects dealt
with visual servoing issues (uncalibrated visual servoing, hand-eye
coordination, active robot vision) - as well as with improved image
processing for robot vision - none of them addressed the problem of
integrating a manipulator hands’ visual guidance with advanced control
algorithm into an embedded system.
None of them was
targeting the goal to overcome the mechanical hardware draw-backs by
sophisticated ARFLEX software approach: to shift from the need to impose
demanding burden to the mechanical design; to realize the same or better
mission requirements (such as precision, speed, etc.) through an optimised
integrated electronic design. When these problems are solved, the new
technology can be implemented in production. |
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The ARFLEX step changes in the sectors
will follow two base directions: the adoption of innovative control design
and the integration in the design of the embedded system technology.
Moreover, part of the ARFLEX efforts
will be dedicated to explore the large potential of diffusion of the
innovative design in all the market sectors, identifying needs,
requirements, solutions. The achievement with respect to the state of the
art in the control concept will be based on the application of new
non-linear complex control theory. |
| ARFLEX will open gateways to most common
devices in the market: smart robot-sensor control requires decentralized
field-bus communication and object oriented software (e.g. CAN, Firewire)
and to be compatible with existent devices in the market (Ethernet,
DeviceNet, etc). Existent architectures do not support gateways to most of
these interfaces. |