Design and Manufacturing Of 2 Dof L Joint Actuator Using Harmonic Drive

Abstract

This article presents the equipment plan and software algorithms of a robotic actuator using harmonic drive. The purpose of using harmonic drive is to achieve zero backlash, high-capacity output bearing, enhanced torque proportion, excellent positioning precision and repeatability, high efficiency, compact design, simple installation, and assembly. High speed and accurate actuation is achieved by using AC servo motor so we use servo motors, as they are fast and precise. The controller used is Arduino mega and a Graphical User Interface (GUI) is developed to control the motor. We target to achieve a payload capacity of 10kg, with an accuracy of 1mm. The project is blocks based i.e., 1 block adds 1 DOF to the project and the joint (2nd block) with second block outputs the 2nd DOF and so on. The basic idea is to have the block-based structures in order to achieve additional DOF motion by adding additional blocks. The diameter of each block remains the same, but the length of each block is defined according to the task it has to perform. The project eventually leads to an industrial grade manipulator. In phase one only 1 DOF link is being designed which can be replicated to make a multi-DOF robot