An Exhaustive Study of the Workspace Topologies of all 3R Orthogonal Manipulators with Geometric Simplifications

TL;DR

This paper provides a comprehensive analysis of the workspace topologies of all 3R orthogonal manipulators with at least one zero DH parameter, classifying them into groups based on workspace topology and evaluating their kinematic properties.

Contribution

It offers a complete classification of these manipulators' workspace topologies and detailed evaluation of their kinematic features, filling a gap in robotic workspace analysis.

Findings

Classified manipulators into groups based on workspace topology

Identified regions with multiple inverse kinematic solutions

Analyzed the size of voids and feasible path regions

Abstract

This paper analyses the workspace of the three-revolute orthogonal manipulators that have at least one of their DH parameters equal to zero. These manipulators are classified into different groups with similar kinematic properties. The classification criteria are based on the topology of the workspace. Each group is evaluated according to interesting kinematic properties such as the size of the workspace subregion reachable with four inverse kinematic solutions, the existence and the size of voids, and the size of the regions of feasible paths in the workspace.