Object Manipulation Using Unlimited Rolling Contacts: 2-D Kinematic Modeling and Motion Planning

In a wheeled-tip manipulation system, the wheels at the tip of robot fingers grasp objects and manipulate them by rolling over their boundaries. In this paper, we introduce a 2-D kinematic modeling for wheeled-tip manipulation systems in order to handle rolling over objects' corners in the manipulation. The modeling facilitates motion planning through projecting grasp stability conditions into configuration space, which unifies the planning of the grasp stability and obstacle avoidance. It is done through defining a static force closure map independent of the obstacles and the robot mechanism. This results in a straightforward planning in PRM framework. The simulation and experimental results support the approach.