Robot-Dummy Crash Tests for Robot Safety Assessment

New technologies and processes enhance the need for direct human-robot-interaction, to fully exploit the potential of robots' accuracy and humans' adaptability. Therefore, the hazardous potential of the involved robot manipulator needs to be minimised. Limits must be set, so that only an acceptable severity of injury for the human will remain in case of an unintended contact between the robot and a human. Current standardisation for industrial robot systems does not sufficiently address the subject of close human-robot-cooperation, thereby restricting the implementation of the newest technology. The aim of the reported research is to demonstrate the possibilities to assess the safety performance of robot systems by robot-dummy impact evaluation. In this paper, methods from the automotive industry are investigated on their transferability to the situation in robotics. Anthropomorphic test devices, so called crash test dummies, that resemble the human's kinematic response in car crashes are analysed during a robot-dummy impact. A simulation setup with the dummy FAT ES-2 representing the operator and an industrial robot is realised within LS-DYNA to conduct impacts of the robot arm against the head and the chest. The resulting head injury index (HIC), the viscous criteria (VC) for the chest and the pubic symphysis peak force (PSPF) for the pelvis are discussed, showing their potential and limitations for the situation in robotics.