A solution to the singular inverse kinematic problem for a manipulation robot mounted on a track

A singular inverse kinematic problem for the ASEA IRb-6 manipulator mounted on a track has been solved using the normal form approach. The solution consists of two steps. First, it is established that in a neighbourhood of singular configurations the kinematics of this manipulator assume the hyperbolic normal form. Then an inversion algorithm of singular kinematics is presented. The performance of this algorithm is illustrated with computer simulations and real robot experiments, that reveal excellent quality of the proposed solution. Although implemented on an exemplary manipulator, the approach extends to general manipulation robots mounted on a track.