TABLE OF CONTENTS Mo z Cherif, School of Engineering Science, Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, B. C, Canada
Kamal K. Gupta, Schoo l of Engineering Science, Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, B.C, Canada
We describe a global motion planner for manipulating 3D objects by a dextrous robotic hand. We focus on the so-called re-configuration problem: find a feasible trajectory (motions and contact forces) that moves a hand-object system, from an initial grasp to a final desired configuration of the object. The planner is designed as a three-level process combining a graph search on the configuration space of the object and a local planner that solves for feasible instantaneous quasi-static motions of the entire manipulation system. The planner is applied in simulation for achieving several complex re-configuration tasks for (piecewise-) smooth convex objects demonstrating the promise of our approach.
We are interested in planning dextrous motions of a multi-fingered hand for manipulating an object held in its grasp. The problem interests us for two main reasons. The first reason is the intrinsic complexity of the problem (from a motion planning perspective) that involves constraints at several different levels - kinematics of contact motion between fingertips and the held object, no-collision between multiple moving bodies (i.e., the finger chains), (non-linear) friction constraints, effects of rolling and sliding contacts on the stability and the generation of instantaneous motions, constraints due to hand kinematics, and the large number of degrees of freedom of the manipulation system. The second reason is that such planning capabilities...
