ABSTRACT

This work outlines the design and the simulation of a 5-DOF (Degree of Freedom) robotic arm. The working and assembly diagram for the arm was produced and the specific parts identified to specifications. The robotic arm is intended to bring to bear the benefits and advantages in the place of substituting humans with robots in most predominantly risky work environments and activities, such as is seen in most local ovens in Nigeria today. A model of the robotic arm structure was designed using AutoCAD software and the simulation of the robotic arm was achieved by using Solidworks Study motion (SSM) to visualize the joint movements. Denavit-Hartenberg methodology was employed for solving dynamic and kinematics of the mechanism by analyzing the movement and relationship between the joints and links in space and the pose of the gripper, relative to the reference frame for the robot. The design involves the use of actuators also known as servos to power the joints and to implement the inverse kinematics of the robotic arm for transmission of motion at each connecting joint and control was achieved by soft commands from the micro controller. Suitable servo motors were selected and assigned to provide the required torque at each joint location. The servos can control the angular position, velocity and acceleration of the output shaft in a precise manner. The Arduino micro controller was suitably selected for its outstanding properties which include being compatible with android platforms as well as manual and personal computer platforms among others. The software allows the robotic arm gripper to be positioned in space, by specifying the coordinates of its centre position. The robotic arm was tested by specifying various coordinates for the gripper with reference to the robot's base and measuring the corresponding coordinates of the centre position of the gripper. The simulation of the various components as well as the entire assembly was done and the animation demonstration gave satisfactory results. Comparative results from direct observations of manual loading/unloading across various local oven against the robotic arm shows a 56.25% gain in production time for every100 circles, which shows that the introduction of robots to load and unload bread within the harsh environments of our local ovens will not only increase safe production but will also ensure optimization of resources and material handling which will lead to a more stable and economic system in the long run.