Unified analysis on mobility and manipulability of mobile manipulators

Abstract

This paper presents an unified approach to the task space analysis of a wheeled mobile manipulator interacting with the environment. The system considered consists of two articulated manipulators atop a wheeled mobile platform handling a common object. We derive the task space ellipsoid, both kinematics and dynamics, for a wheeled mobile manipulator which takes into account manipulation and locomotion. The ellipsoid is able to visualize how the manipulator and the platform can contribute to a task execution by integrating the mobility of the platform with the manipulability of the arms as one unified measure. This measure can be useful not only for the task space analysis of a single mobile manipulator, but also for the coordination of multiple arms, mobile robots or mobile manipulators.