Design and Implementation of a Safety Application for Workspace and Velocity Monitoring of a 6-DOF Articulated Robot

Robots are becoming increasingly prevalent in the automation industry due to their versatility and wide range of potential applications. By simply modifying its software, the same robotic manipulator can be adapted to perform different tasks. In industrial contexts, various types of robots are used: the focus of this thesis is a six-degrees-of-freedom articulated robotic arm. Its name well describes its structure, as it consists of six revolute joints, enabling a range of motions similar to that of a human arm. Like all machines, robots must be equipped with devices, protective measures, and dedicated software to ensure the safety of people working around them. Several solutions exist to meet these safety requirements, with the most common being the use of physical safeguards to enclose the robot, effectively isolating it from human operators. To reduce costs and minimize the system's footprint, these safeguards are positioned as close as possible to the robot's working area. Moreover, they are designed not to withstand direct impacts from the robot itself but rather to contain potential hazards, such as objects being thrown by the manipulator. In this context, the goal of this thesis project is to initiate the implementation of the safety features to ensure the robot operates securely. This includes keeping the robot within its designated workspace, preventing collisions with safeguards, maintaining safe operating speed, and addressing other safety considerations. On the hardware side, the robot is equipped with CtrlX drives from Bosch Rexroth, which provide position and velocity data for each joint via a secure fieldbus connection. These data are then processed by safety PLCs from Beckhoff and BBH to enforce the necessary safety measures.