Smart Grasping Control of Serial Link Manipulator using NI myRIO

With the advancement of technology in Global era, robotics is anticipated as one of the emerging field of science. Robots are gradually replacing humans and are performing complex tasks which humans are unable to perform. Robotic arm has its importance in heavy industry and in manufacturing processes for optimum results. The main task is to design a system that is capable of controlling a mechanical arm and is able to apply appropriate force to grab the targeted object. The entire robotic arm hardware setup is controlled with National Instruments myRIO-1900 kit in LabVIEW environment. Serial linked robot ED7220C is a five-joints and six degrees of freedom, robotic arm with rigid links. Object detection and classification is performed through a USB camera on LabVIEW in real time. First, the object is detected then according to its dynamic algorithm which classify the shape of object into circular, rectangular and elliptical shapes. Then the coordinate of these objects are provided as input to the robotic arm which can track the object based on the extracted information. Force control is also an essential part in the robot’s control design. Without control a robot may damage the object when it comes in contact with it. A force sensor is used to control the force exerted on the object. Force Sensitive Resistor (FSR) is used to determine the force or pressure that can be applied to the object. The experiments are connected with NI-myRIO-1900 and the FSR mounted inside the gripper of the robotic arm.