Optimal mechanical design, model-based control, and robot dynamic calibration mainly rely on the analytical formulation of robot dynamics. In this paper, the kinematics equations of a general 3-UPU translational parallel manipulator (TPM) are derived, and then, by using the principle of the virtual work theorem, the full implicit dynamic model is derived. Furthermore, by making some modifications, the explicit dynamic formulation of the robot is attained, which is the basis of a wide range of advanced model-based controllers. To validate the proposed formulation, a prototype of the 3-UPU TPM is modeled in MSC-ADAMS® software, and the results of the dynamic formulation are validated using this model. The results show the high accuracy of the proposed dynamic formulation presented in this article.

This paper addresses the trajectory tracking control problem for a quadrotor aerial vehicle, equipped with a robotic manipulator (aerial manipulator). The controller is organized in two layers: in the top layer, an inverse kinematics algorithm computes the motion references for the actuated variables; in the bottom layer, a motion control algorithm is in charge of tracking the motion references computed by the upper layer. To the purpose, a model-based control scheme is adopted, where modelling uncertainties are compensated through an adaptive term. The stability of the proposed scheme is proven by resorting to Lyapunov arguments. Finally, a simulation case study is proposed to prove the effectiveness of the approach.

The dynamic modeling and trajectory following issues are addressed for mobile modular manipulators. Simulations are performed to validate the proposed algorithms.

Although numerous sophisticated nonlinear control algorithms exist in literature, it is still state of the art to use simple linear joint controllers in industrial robotic systems. Most nonlinear concepts are based on a more or less accurate inverse model of the robot. In this paper a forward-model-based control system, the so-called Model Following Control (MFC), for robot manipulators is presented. Its theoretical basics and its concept are explained. The quality and the applicability of the MFC control concept has been analyzed in many experiments. The MFC system is compared with classical linear controllers and nonlinear feedforward controllers with respect to robustness. Qualitative as well as quantitative results are presented and discussed.