Development of a 3-DOF Haptic Tele-manipulator System Using Magnetorheological Brakes

In this work, a tele-manipulator system with force feedback (Haptic tele-manipulator) is designed and manufactured. The haptic tele-manipulator system in this study consists of two main parts: slave and master manipulator. The slave manipulator is a three 3-rotary degrees of freedom (DOF) manipulator and driven by AC servo motors. At the end effector of the slave manipulator a 3D force sensor are mounted to measure impact force from the environment. The master manipulator is used to control the slave manipulator; it has a structure and shape similar to the slave manipulator. At the joints of the master manipulator, magneto-rheological brakes (MRBs) are installed. They are meants to create the variable braking torque in order to generate a required resultant force acting to the master operator. The value of required resultant force is obtained from sensors mounted on the slave manipulator. In this way, the operator of the master manipulator can feel the force at the end effector of the slave during its operation.