Human-robot coordination with rotational motion

The human-robot coordination with rotational motion is discussed and experimented. In order to deal with the rotational motion, a new force sensor is proposed to measure the force provided by the human operator in addition to the force sensor previously proposed for the compliant motion of the robot. The force sensor on the human-hand side interprets the desired motion of the human operator while the force sensor of the robot side defines the actual motion of the end-effector. The two motions then serve as the reference input and actual output of the feedback control system respectively. With the new force sensor, load distribution becomes a simple issue. It can be done by simply specifying a distribution factor which determines the ratio between the forces provided by the robot and the arm respectively. Experiment shows that the coordination scheme is effective for both the rotational and translational motions in the human-robot coordination.