مدل داده ربات صنعتی سازگار باSTEP برای سیستم های آفلاین برنامه نویسی روبات

Recently, various robot off-line programming systems have promoted their own robot data models, resulting in a plethora of robot representation methods and unchangeable data files among CAx and robot off-line programming systems. The current paper represents a STEP-compliant Industrial Robot Data Model (IRDM) for data exchange between CAx systems and robot off-line programming systems. Using this novel representation method, most resources involved in a robot manufacturing system can be represented. The geometric and mathematic aspects of industrial robots have been defined in IRDM, so that the robot off-line programming system could have abundant information to represent robots’ kinematic and dynamic behaviors. In order to validate the proposed models and approaches, a prototype robot off-line programming system with 3D virtual environment is presented. The functionalities of IRDM not only have significant meaning for providing a unified data platform for robot simulation systems, but also have the potential capability to represent robot language using the object-oriented concept.

Modern industries have been more and more heavily dependent on industrial robots [1]. In the early applications of robots (such as material transfer, precision assembly, welding and painting), the path planning tasks are usually very simple. Hence, the online teach in and playback mode can handle with most robot programming tasks. However, the increasing demands of 3D path planning in traditional and new emerging applications like machining have gradually revealed the necessity of robot off-line programming systems [2]. Therefore, many academic and commercial activities have been conducted into this field in the latest several years, and many software solutions have been released, such as V-Rep, Robotmaster and Robotworks. Besides, even some traditional machine tool related manufacturing software developers, such as Delcam, VeriCUT and ST-Machine, have also incorporated their own off-line robot programming capabilities [3].

The STEP standard is used to represent the data models of industrial robot systems. The authors aim to found a unified data model to exchange information between different CAx and robot off-line programming systems. Those information content is categorized into product model, process model, resource model and mathematic model. In IRDM, the industrial robot resources and the kinematic and dynamic aspects of a robot have been successfully represented using the STEP EXPRESS schema. In addition, the object-oriented concept in STEP-NC is extended to other manufacturing tasks besides machining. The new data models were effectively implemented in an independently developed prototype of robot off-line programming system, and its feasibility was successfully verified.