An Innovation to Robotics - A Robotic Arm with Swappable Tools!
Developed for my school's science and engineering fair, I designed a robotic arm equipped with a tool changer to swap between tools and improve future robotic space exploration missions.
Problem Statement:
Current robotic missions are locked into research with the select tools and instruments that they are deployed with. This doesn’t allow for much flexibility when faced with unforeseen challenges or research opportunities. These constraints limit the total flexibility of a mission, allows for higher failure rates, and limits long-term operational capabilities.
With these thoughts in mind, I started on a prototype for a robotic arm with a tool changer.
This project, although only being a proof of concept, shows a promising sign for future robotic space missions. It was able to swap between a variety of tools without any physical human interaction, and was capable of transmitting power over fully detachable interfaces.
There were some points that could be strengthened, such as in the code and movement to pick up a tool. Which could be improved by upgrading the rigidity of the arm, reducing play, and then integrating new code to allow autonomous docking rather than manual control, but that's a project for another day.