Enabling Fixtureless Assemblies in Human-Robot Collaborative Workcells by Reducing Uncertainty in the Part Pose Estimate

Published

December 6, 2018

Author(s)

Nithyananda Kumbla, Jeremy Marvel, Satyandra K. Gupta

Abstract

This paper presents an automated part localization technique for performing fixtureless assembly operations in a human-robot collaborative workcell. The main focus of this paper is to localize the part in the least possible time and ensure the part is not damaged during the contact-based probing phase due to the uncertainty in the preliminary pose estimation. Given the preliminary estimate of the part pose in the workcell, we automatically generate contact patches on the part for probing. We then estimate the probing time by considering the different combination of patches and select the combination with the least estimated probing time. The robot motions for part probing consider the potential error in the initial estimate to keep the part safe during the contact-based localization procedure. The probed positions of the contact patches are used to reduce the uncertainty in the part pose. We have characterized the performance of the developed method using both simulation and experimental studies.

Proceedings Title

IEEE International Conference on Automation Science and Engineering

Conference Dates

August 20-24, 2018

Conference Location

Munich, DE

Pub Type

Conferences

Download Paper

https://doi.org/10.1109/COASE.2018.8560505

Local Download

Keywords

Fixtureless assembly, human-robot collaborative workcell, contact-based localization, part probing, uncertainty reduction, sensor feedback

Citation

Kumbla, N. , Marvel, J. and Gupta, S. (2018), Enabling Fixtureless Assemblies in Human-Robot Collaborative Workcells by Reducing Uncertainty in the Part Pose Estimate, IEEE International Conference on Automation Science and Engineering, Munich, DE, [online], https://doi.org/10.1109/COASE.2018.8560505, https://tsapps.nist.gov/publication/get_pdf.cfm?pub_id=925830 (Accessed October 13, 2025)