Logical Control Theory Applied to Mechanical Arms
Submitted to the Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science on January 19, 1979 in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Degrees of Master of Science and Electrical Engineer. This report describes research done at the Artificial Intelligence Laboratory of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Support for the laboratory's artificial intelligence research is provided in part by the Advanced Research Projects Agency of the Department of Defense under Office of Naval Research contract N00014-75-C-0643. Thesis supervisor: Berthold K. P. Horn, Associate Professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science
Working Paper
A new control algorithm based upon Logical Control Theory is developed for mechanical manipulators. The controller uses discrete tesselations of state space and a finite set of fixed torques to regulate non-rehearsed movements in real time. Varying effective inertia, coupling between degrees of freedom, and fictional, gravitational and Coriolis forces are readily handled. A logical controller was implemented on a mini-computer for the MIT Scheinman Vicarm. The controller's performance compares favorably with that of controllers designed according to existing methodologies as used, for example, in the control of present day industrial manipulators.