H.2.6 ROTEX (Vision-guided grasping in Space)

SpaceLab D2 on board Space Shuttle Orbiter ‘Columbia’ (1993)

[with DLR Oberpfaffenhofen, ‘Robot Technology Experiment’, Prof. G. Hirzinger]

• Robot arm [Hirzinger et al. 1994] with 4 sections plus a two-fingered hand (see top right of figure).
• arm secluded in a cabin of size ~ 50x80x110 cm (see top left of figure) within the German SpaceLab D2 on board Space Shuttle orbiter ‘Columbia’.
• In the palm of the robot hand 2 miniature cameras were mounted (K1 and K2, center right); there were many more sensors integrated in the hand and the fingers [Hirzinger et al. 1994].
• Robot control was to be remote from “Mission control” in Oberpfaffenhofen, but autonomous (without a human in the loop); a variable time delay from image taking till control implementation on board of up to 7 seconds occurred due to complex routing through several satellites and computer centers on the ground (see bottom figure).
• Initial pointing of the robot arm was done by a human operator so that the free-flyer was in the field of view of the cameras.
• A transputer system was used for vision [Dickmanns D 1997].

For experimental results with the US-Space-Shuttle flight ‚Columbia-D2‘ in May 1993 see

A.7 Vision-guided grasping in Space

Video – ROTEX- GraspingInSpace 1993