Design of an Arm Section for a Direct Drive SCARA Robot having the Minimum Cycle Time

【Many algorithms to enhance a speed performance of a robot have been studied, but it's rare to consider disign aspect of a robot arm for time optimal problem. In this paper, section demensions of a robot arm and a velocity profile of an end-effector were optimally designed to minimize the cycle time. Capacity of actuators, deflections of end-effector, and a fundamental natural frequency of the robot arm were constrained in optimal design. For a given path with a trapezoidal velocity profile, torques of each joint were calculated using the inverse kinematics and dynamics. For the SCARA type robot which is mainly used for assembly tasks, the time optimal design of each robot arm id presented with the above constraints.】