Modeling, Simulation and Kinematics Calculations of Stanford Manipulator

Robots are very powerful elements of today's industry. They are capable of performing many different tasks and operations with precision and do not require common safety and comfort elements human needs. In designing a robot manipulator, kinematics plays a vital role. The kinematic problem of manipulator control is divided into two types, direct kinematics and inverse kinematics. The mathematical calculations of direct and inverse kinematics based on the theoretical procedure are time taking, difficult, less accurate, slow, and laborious. Robot inverse kinematics, which is important in robot path planning, is a fundamental problem in robotic control. Past solutions for this problem have been through the use of various algebraic or algorithmic procedures, which may be less accurate and time consuming. In the present work an attempt has been made to find direct kinematics and inverse kinematics of STANFORD, SCORBOT, SCARA, ELBOW serial manipulators using the software Visual Basic 6 by using mathematical equations of direct and inverse kinematics and also to create and simulate STANFORD manipulator using the software AutoCAD, AutoCAD ActiveX Automation and Visual Basic Applications (VBA). A program is developed using Visual Basic 6 for generating direct and inverse kinematics of four serial manipulators for the given input data. Using AutoCAD, AutoCAD ActiveX Automation, and VBA, a program is written for simulating STANFORD manipulator.