Virtual force feedback in teleoperation for enhanced manipulator performance

In master-slave teleoperation, slave manipulator can be easily led to low-performance configurations when the structures of master and slave manipulators are dissimilar. To amend the problem, a novel method based on virtual force feedback is proposed. Local Conditioning Index and Joint Range Availability are revised and adopted for a better manipulator performance evaluation. Virtual force is calculated online based on these performance measures, and force direction is the gradient of a performance measure. To achieve different goals, virtual feedback force is used as guidance force or repulsive force. This method is adopted in a teleoperation system which is composed of a CyberForce haptic device and an anthropomorphic 7-DOF manipulator. Two simulations are designed and carried out to verify the validity of performance measures and virtual force.