An online robot trajectory planning and programming support system for industrial use

The manufacturing industry today is still looking for enhancement of their production. Programming of articulated production robots is a major area for improvement. Today, offline simulation modified by manual programming is widely used to reduce production downtimes but requires financial investments in terms of additional personnel and equipment costs. The requirements have been evaluated considering modern manufacturing aspects and a new online robot trajectory planning and programming support system is presented for industrial use. The proposed methodology is executed solely online, rendering offline simulation obsolete and thereby reduces costs. To enable this system, a new cell-based Voronoi generation algorithm, together with a trajectory planner, is introduced. The robot trajectories so achieved are comparable to manually programmed robot programs. The results for a Mitsubishi RV-2AJ five axis industrial robot are presented. (c) 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.