Modeling and Identification of Wear in a Robot Joint under Temperature Uncertainties

Abstract

AbstractThis paper considers the problem of wear estimation in a standard industrial robot joint. The effects of wear on the static friction of a robot joint are analyzed from experiments. An extended static friction model is proposed that explains changes related to joint speed, load, temperature and wear. Based on this model and static friction observations, a model-based wear estimator is proposed. The performance of the estimator under temperature uncertainties is found both by means of simulations and experiments on an industrial robot. Special attention is given to the analyses of the best speed region for wear estimation. As it is shown, the method can distinguish the effects of wear even under large temperature variations, opening up for the use of robust joint diagnosis for industrial robots.