Object conveyance system "Magic Carpet" consisting of 64 linear actuators-object position feedback control with object position estimation

An object transfer system called "Magic Carpet" composed of a linear actuator array and driven by an autonomous decentralized type control algorithm is proposed. An object is manipulated by a large number of contact points with many actuators, which differs from conventional systems like a belt conveyor. In the paper, the control algorithm for such "distributed manipulation" is proposed. Due to the development of micromachine technology, distributed manipulation has become more important. This system has a big advantage in its fault tolerance because it has a lot of actuators with poor performance to move a large heavy object. However, it has a serious wiring problem to be solved and an homogeneous structure should be introduced because of the large number actuators. To solve these problems, "combined control of central/autonomous decentralized algorithms" is proposed and the effectiveness of the proposed object position control algorithm based on feedback is confirmed by computer simulation. To realize this feedback, an object position estimation algorithm is also proposed.