Prognostic Framework for Robotic Manipulators Operating Under Dynamic Task Severities

TL;DR

This paper introduces a prognostic framework for robotic manipulators that predicts their remaining useful life by modeling task severity effects on position accuracy, validated through simulations showing shorter RUL with higher-severity tasks.

Contribution

The paper presents a novel probabilistic modeling framework incorporating task severity dynamics via a Markov chain to predict robot RUL, with closed-form and simulation-based evaluation methods.

Findings

Higher task severity shortens robot RUL.

The framework accurately predicts RUL using theoretical and simulation approaches.

Validation with physics-based simulators confirms the model's effectiveness.

Abstract

Robotic manipulators are critical in many applications but are known to degrade over time. This degradation is influenced by the nature of the tasks performed by the robot. Tasks with higher severity, such as handling heavy payloads, can accelerate the degradation process. One way this degradation is reflected is in the position accuracy of the robot's end-effector. In this paper, we present a prognostic modeling framework that predicts a robotic manipulator's Remaining Useful Life (RUL) while accounting for the effects of task severity. Our framework represents the robot's position accuracy as a Brownian motion process with a random drift parameter that is influenced by task severity. The dynamic nature of task severity is modeled using a continuous-time Markov chain (CTMC). To evaluate RUL, we discuss two approaches -- (1) a novel closed-form expression for Remaining Lifetime Distribution (RLD), and (2) Monte Carlo simulations, commonly used in prognostics literature. Theoretical results establish the equivalence between these RUL computation approaches. We validate our framework through experiments using two distinct physics-based simulators for planar and spatial robot fleets. Our findings show that robots in both fleets experience shorter RUL when handling a higher proportion of high-severity tasks.