Path Planning of Nonholonomic Robots with Elastic Revolute Joints

This paper presents optimal control method to path planning of mobile robots with flexible joints. Dynamic equations are derived and additional kinematic constraints are used to solve the extra Dofs that of base mobility. Then with modeling the elasticity at each joint as a linear torsinal spring the set of equations are formed. The Hamiltonian function is formed and the necessary conditions for optimality are derived from the Pontryagin's minimum principle. The obtained equations established a two point boundary value problem solved by numerical techniques. A mobile flexible joint manipulator is studied to verify the feasibility of the proposed approach.

Keywords:

Flexible Joint Manipulator , Optimal Control , Path Planning