Robust Fault-Tolerant Control for Robotic Systems

In this paper, a robust fault-tolerant control scheme for robot manipulators overcoming actuator failures is presented. The joint(or actuator) fault considered in this paper is the free-swinging joint failure and causes the loss of torque on a joint. The presented fault-tolerant control framework includes a normal control with normal(non-failed) operation, a fault detection and a fault-tolerant control to achieve task completion. For both no uncertainty case and uncertainty case, a stable normal con-troller and an on-line fault detection scheme are presented. After the detection and identification of joint failures, the robot manipulator becomes the underactuated robot system with failed actuators. A robust adaptive control scheme of robot manipulators with the detected failed-actuators using the brakes equipped at the failed(passive) joints is proposed in the presence of parametric uncertainty and external disturbances. To illustrate the feasibility and validity of the proposed fault-tolerant control scheme, simulation results for a three-link planar robot arm with a failed joint are presented.