the robot laboratory was established at
goddard to prepare for the flight tele
robotics servicer fts operations on the
space station
it contained several elements graphic
simulations for defining engineering
criteria definition of operational
scenarios which show how the fts will
operate on space station task
decomposition which breaks the robot
operations down to primitive tasks to
see how they perform on space station
operator interfaces and workstation
designs software development and
operational training
here you see a picture of the fts in the
shuttle bay preparing to assemble an
attached payload station interface
adapter
this equipment will interface attached
payloads to the space station
the remote manipulator system or rms in
the space shuttle bay is preparing to
lift the station interface adapter sia
out of the cargo bay in close proximity
to the truss
the fts is erected next to the sia and
deploys one of the legs from its stowed
positions
after the leg is deployed the others are
subsequently deployed and the sia is
brought up to the structural trust nodes
by the fts
this allows the interface adapter to be
secured in a soft dock position
following this the fts through a tool
attached to its end defector brings the
joint in close proximity and fastens it
to the truss
the rms now goes back to the cargo bay
and lifts a deck carrier with an oru or
orbital replacement unit out of the bay
bringing it in close proximity to the
sie
the fts attaches itself to the sie and
the deck carrier and brings the two
together to hard dock or secure the two
elements a crank is turned which
actuates the lead screw mechanism
bringing the two together
this is a description of a hierarchical
ada language robot programming system
are
harps
the harps is a programmed robot system
using the nazrim architecture which
stands for nasa reference model
this is the architecture established by
the national institute of science and
technology and it is hierarchical in its
form
on the left is sensor processing
in the middle world models of the fts
and its environment
and on the right
task decomposition
at the very lowest levels it has been
implemented to operate with joysticks on
a simulated robot to show how the robot
will interact with the tasks it works on
here's a picture of the operator working
with joysticks to bring the simulated
end effector of the robot in proximity
to a handle on the orbital replacement
unit
you'll notice it turns yellow when
approaching the handle and red when it
actually contacts it
this permits the operator to learn the
best scenario for assembly
the fts operational simulator has
performed various tasks as you have seen
in the software simulation the leg
deployment
the docking to the truss the duct
carrier movement to the sie the hard
docking and in addition the thermal
coupler and enter oru exchange
these tasks were built with full-scale
models of space station hardware and
utilized floor-mounted puma or research
robots in lieu of the fts
here's the operator workstation with the
operator using joysticks to control the
robot arms
here the gantry robot which emulates the
rms brings the station interface adapter
sia to the side of the truss
the puma robot is positioning itself to
the handle on the leg through a machine
vision system
this is a computer vision system which
through a camera and computer will
recognize four dots on the white
background target
aligning the tool and end effector to
the target the end effector is inserted
into the hole or in the end effector
jaws are closed to fasten it to the
handle
once engaged the robots through the
operator in the computer will bring the
leg to the deployed position
once deployed a latching system keeps
the leg in a fixed configuration
at this point the robot disengages from
the leg and is placed in a stowed
condition
the gantry now lowers the station
interface adapter onto the truss face
where it is soft docked which means that
a latching system will keep it in
position so that when the gantry is
removed there will be no motion of the
station interface adapter
in the space world when the rms leaves
the sia doesn't disengage from the truss
and now the robot comes down
and fastens a nut connecting a screw
into the node of the space station truss
by
ratcheting the end effector
now the gantry picks up the deck carrier
and the attached payload and moves it to
the truss sia interface
this is all pre-programmed into the
gantry controller in real life the rms
will be operated from the aft flight
deck of the shuttle
in future months in the laboratory a
mock-up of the aft flight deck will
permit a crewman to operate the gantry
from the space shuttle
now the deck carrier is brought down
onto the sia through a series of pins
and cones underneath
it aligns itself and drops on the soft
dock
lead screw held in the center
this has a motorized nut which if the
proper power were available would draw
the deck carrier to the sia
the robot in the event of power outage
or no power availability can manually
crank the screw
as shown here to bring the deck carrier
and the sie in the assembled
configuration
the robot now moves over to a thermal
coupler this is an extension device
which would permit fluids which are
needed by the attached payload to be
joined to the main utility lines on the
space station
the handle which you will notice is a
common handle we use to interface the
robotic end effector to the task it will
be doing
it lifts one half of the coupler which
would have a hose connection to the
payload down to the leg of the sia which
simulates the position of the thermal
utility on the space station
a soft dock connection is then made
which would permit the coupler to be
held together while the end effector is
released to do other
operations this is the first step
required to make the connection you'll
see that the robot arm is twisting the
coupler in position
indications on the screen for the
operator on his left shown as yellow
bars indicate the positions of the
joints of the robot
in the center of the bar shot the
vertical bars indicate the forces on the
coupler when they are reduced to zero it
means that there is no stress on the
coupler and it will stay in position
when released you'll notice the same
target appears for the cameras
the jaws close in the reset position and
now the robot moves over to a collar
containing a screw which when actuated
as shown brings the two couplers
together to finally fasten the two
halves in a sealed condition
in this configuration shown the robot is
opening a door to a simulated attached
payload the door is opened by the robot
this is to simulate the exchange of an
inter-orbital replacement unit of a
failed component or film package
exchange for an instrument for instance
the robot goes through its motions
autonomously that is the computer has
set the trajectory
now the robot reaches into the inner box
attaches itself to the oru
and lifts it out
it then places the oru on a stand which
has been designed to accept a receptacle
on the bottom for power conditioning and
thermal control
the next series of tests were performed
on the engineering test bed
this test bed contains a pair of seven
degree of freedom robot arms and hand
controllers
it is used to develop control algorithms
or mathematical laws to determine the
robot operation a safety system to
protect the robot from collisions in
defectors for gripping objects in the
space environment and dynamic models in
order to replicate zero gravity motions
and determine instabilities
here
the operator is controlling the large
seven degree of freedom robot
by seven degrees of freedom it contains
unlike the puma robots you've seen
before an additional joint which permits
it to reach around objects much as the
elbow of a human arm
it is shown in the upright position
the operator has a mini master hand
controller which is a replication of his
arm
every motion he makes is followed by the
robot in a master slave operation
now the operator is bringing the end
effector which has roller grippers for
secure mating to the side of a handle on
the white column
you will notice he uses his fingers to
index the arm
indexing means small motions in the arm
left and right will permit large motions
in the robot arm such that the operator
does not have to make inordinate motions
to move the slave robot through large
trajectories
now the operator is lining the end
effector up to the handle
in future days we will have what is
called force reflection in the handle
such that when the operator makes
contact with the handle and closes the
jaws of the gripper
forces of connections will be felt by
the operator so that he gets a feel for
the operation and permits more dextrous
and accurate operation
the next sequence shows the dexterity of
the robot with its large number of
degrees of freedom it can move through a
very wide sphere of motion here it is
shown reaching up in back of a camera
which is mounted on the top
if indeed the camera were out of focus
or needed repositioning the robot could
essentially
change the camera position if needed
essentially it can do maintenance on
itself
you will notice the very dexterous
operation of that arm
the lab expansion program has been
designed as a new construction of
facilities initiative in order to
provide more space for users research
activities and flight hardware
integration
it contains fifteen thousand square feet
and would cost approximately three and a
half million dollars to build
we're hoping to get it ready in mid 1990
however the current plan is to have it
in a state of readiness by the end of
1992
here is an artist concept of the lab on
the right the laboratories that exist
today with the gantry robot the control
workstation and the mezzanine for
software development on the left we have
the expanded building which will house
two laboratory modules
the modules emulate the lab modules on
the space station from which astronauts
can operate in a simulated environment
housed at the other end of the building
the new extension will have many robots
for doing research work advanced
technology and clean room integration of
flight articles before they migrate to
the main laboratory for testing
this facility will permit upgrading
software and hardware of the flight tele
robotics servicer on space station
you