Patent · US Expired

Robot feature tracking devices and methods

US6430472B1 · kind B1 · utility

58Cited by
20References
20Claims
0Family size

Assignee

Inventors

Key dates

Filing dateDec 20, 1999
Grant dateAug 6, 2002
Priority date
Expiry dateDec 20, 2019

Classification

  • Technology area (CPC G)Physics
  • CPC primaryG05B2219/14093
  • WIPO fieldControl
  • WIPO sectorInstruments

Abstract

Motorized slides are inserted between the end of a robot arm and a robot tool/sensor arrangement to provide additional positioning ability. A control unit of the slides cooperates with the control unit of the sensor to maintain the tool correctly positioned over a feature while the robot arm moves following a programmed path. The control unit of the sensor has look-ahead and additional buffers from which corrected information is determined to compensate for robot teaching inaccuracies, calibration and robot arm response errors. A sensor with two distinct probing zones is used to get information about the position of the tool tip and of the feature to assist in calibrating the sensor/tool relation.

Source: USPTO / EPO open patent data. Objective bibliographic and citation counts.