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Large gear components widely exist in the transmission system of helicopters, ships, etc. Due to the small assembly clearance of large gear components, using an automatic docking system based on position control will lead to forced assembly. The purpose of this paper is to reduce the assembly stress of large gear components by an active compliant docking technology based on distributed force sensors.

Firstly, aiming at the noise interference in three-dimensional force sensor (TDFS), Kalman filter and Savitzky–Golay filter are used to process the sensor’s output signal. Secondly, the active compliant docking control model is constructed according to the principle of impedance control. Thirdly, the contact force is calculated based on the Euler equation, and the impedance control parameters are tuned by the particle swarm optimization algorithm. Finally, an active compliant docking system of a large gear structure based on distributed force sensor is built in the laboratory to verify the proposed method.

The experimental results show that the contact force and contact torque gradually decrease in all directions and are always in the safe range during the docking process. The feasibility of this method in practical application is preliminarily demonstrated.

The distributed TDFSs are used to replace the traditional six-dimensional force sensor in the active compliant docking system of gear components, which solves the problem of the small bearing capacity of the conventional active compliant docking system. This method can also be used for the docking of other large components.

The purpose of this paper is to propose a hybrid position/force control scheme using force and vision for docking task of a six degrees of freedom (6-dof) hydraulic parallel manipulator (HPM).

The vision system consisted of a charge-coupled device (CCD) camera, and a laser distance sensor is used to provide globe relative position information. Also, a force plate is used to measure local contact forces. The proposed controller has an inner/outer loop structure. The inner loop takes charge of tracking command pose signals from outer loop as accurate as possible, while the outer loop generates the desired tracking trajectory according to force and vision feedback information to guarantee compliant docking. Several experiments have been performed to validate the performance of the proposed control scheme.

Experiment results show that the system has good performance of relative position tracking and compliant contact. In whole docking dynamic experiment, the amplitudes of contact forces are well controlled within 300 N, which can meet perfectly the requirement of the amplitude being not more than 1,000 N.

A hybrid position/force control scheme using force and vision is proposed to make a 6-dof HPM dock with a moving target object compliantly.

This study aims to address the issue of random movement and non coordination between docking mechanisms and locking mechanisms, and proposes a comprehensive dynamic docking control architecture that integrates perception, planning, and motion control.

Firstly, the proposed dynamic docking control architecture uses laser sensors and a charge-coupled device camera to perceive the pose of the target. The sensor data are mapped to a high-dimensional potential field space and fused to reduce interference caused by detection noise. Next, a new potential function based on multi-dimensional space is developed for docking path planning, which enables the docking mechanism based on Stewart platform to rapidly converge to the target axis of the locking mechanism, which improves the adaptability and terminal docking accuracy of the docking state. Finally, to achieve precise tracking and flexible docking in the final stage, the system combines a self-impedance controller and an impedance control algorithm based on the planned trajectory.

Extensive simulations and experiments have been conducted to validate the effectiveness of the dynamic docking system and its control architecture. The results indicate that even if the target moves randomly, the system can successfully achieve accurate, stable and flexible dynamic docking.

This research can provide technical guidance and reference for docking task of unmanned vehicles under the ground conditions. It can also provide ideas for space docking missions, such as space simulator docking.

According to the requirements of servicing and deorbiting the failure satellites, especially the tumbling ones on geosynchronous orbit, this paper aims to design a docking mechanism to capture these tumbling satellites in orbit, to analyze the dynamics of the docking system and to develop a new collision force-limited control method in various docking speeds.

The mechanism includes a cone-rod mechanism which captures the apogee engine with a full consideration of despinning and damping characteristics and a locking and releasing mechanism which rigidly connects the international standard interface ring (Marman rings, such as 937B, 1194 and 1194A mechanical interface). The docking mechanism was designed under-actuated, aimed to greatly reduce the difficulty of control and ensure the continuity, synchronization and force uniformity under the process of repeatedly capturing, despinning, locking and releasing the tumbling satellite. The dynamic model of docking mechanism was established, and the impact force was analyzed in the docking process. Furthermore, a collision detection and compliance control method is proposed by using the active force-limited Cartesian impedance control and passive damping mechanism design.

A variety of conditions were set for the docking kinematics and dynamics simulation. The simulation and low-speed docking experiment results showed that the force translation in the docking phase was stable, the mechanism design scheme was reasonable and feasible and the proposed force-limited Cartesian impedance control could detect the collision and keep the external force within the desired value.

The paper presents a universal docking mechanism and force-limited Cartesian impedance control approach to capture the tumbling non-cooperative satellite. The docking mechanism was designed under-actuated to greatly reduce the difficulty of control and ensure the continuity, synchronization and force uniformity. The dynamic model of docking mechanism was established. The impact force was controlled within desired value by using a combination of active force-limited control approach and passive damping mechanism.

Component positioning is an important part of aircraft assembly, aiming at the problem that it is difficult to accurately fall into the corresponding ball socket for the ball head connected with aircraft component. This study aims to propose a ball head adaptive positioning method based on impedance control.

First, a target impedance model for ball head positioning is constructed, and a reference positioning trajectory is generated online based on the contact force between the ball head and the ball socket. Second, the target impedance parameters were optimized based on the artificial fish swarm algorithm. Third, to improve the robustness of the impedance controller in unknown environments, a controller is designed based on model reference adaptive control (MRAC) theory and an adaptive impedance control model is built in the Simulink environment. Finally, a series of ball head positioning experiments are carried out.

During the positioning of the ball head, the contact force between the ball head and the ball socket is maintained at a low level. After the positioning, the horizontal contact force between the ball head and the socket is less than 2 N. When the position of the contact environment has the same change during ball head positioning, the contact force between the ball head and the ball socket under standard impedance control will increase to 44 N, while the contact force of the ball head and the ball socket under adaptive impedance control will only increase to 19 N.

In this paper, impedance control is used to decouple the force-position relationship of the ball head during positioning, which makes the entire process of ball head positioning complete under low stress conditions. At the same time, by constructing an adaptive impedance controller based on MRAC, the robustness of the positioning system under changes in the contact environment position is greatly improved.

Compared with the robotic manipulation in structured environment, high performance assembly of complex parts in extreme special environment is facing great challenges because of the uncertainty in the environment, and the decline of the control accuracy of the robot and the sensor accuracy. The assembly and construction of the space station is a typical case. An important step in the construction of the space station is the module positioning and docking with the auxiliary of the space manipulator. The operation of the manipulator is faced with many problems, such as low sensing information accuracy, large end position deviation and the requirement of weak impact in the docking process. The purpose of this paper is to design a docking method at the strategy level to effectively solve the problems that may be faced in the docking process.

Inspired by the research of robotic high-precision compliant assembly, this paper introduces the concept of Attractive Region in Environment (ARIE) into the space manipulator–assisted module docking. The contact configuration space of the docking mechanism and the existence of ARIE are systematically analyzed. The docking strategy based on ARIE framework is proposed, in which the impedance control is used to ensure the weak impact during the docking process.

For the androgynous peripheral spacecraft docking mechanism, a large range of attractive region exists in the high-dimensional contact configuration space. The docking strategy based on ARIE framework can be designed according to the geometric characteristics of the constraint region and the structural characteristics of the docking mechanism. The virtual models and the simulation environment are established, and the effectiveness of the proposed method is preliminarily verified.

Based on the research results of robotic precision compliant manipulation, in this paper, the theory of ARIE is first systematically applied to the analysis of spacecraft docking problem and the design of docking scheme. The effectiveness of the proposed docking method is preliminarily verified for the requirements of large position tolerance and weak impact. The research results will provide theoretical support and technical reference for the assembly and construction of space station and other space manipulator operations.

The adoption of efficient consumer response (ECR) has been slow in many regions, despite its many potential benefits to supply chain participants through reduction of inventory level and operating costs. There has not been any well‐developed theory that can explain this slow uptake. Argues that the inherent characteristics of ECR have actually created barriers to its own adoption. As an inter‐organisational system (IOS), ECR adoption requires co‐operation and trust between trading partners, which are unlikely to happen unless costs, benefits and risks of ECR implementation can be mutually shared. Shows, using a case study conducted within one supply chain, that an unequal distribution of costs, benefits and risks among manufacturer, distributor and retailer is inherent in the implementation of cross‐docking, which typifies the overall ECR program. The findings of this study lead to a new direction in understanding the barriers to adoption of ECR and IOS in general.

This paper aims to focus on the spatial docking task of unmanned vehicles under ground conditions. The docking task of military unmanned vehicle application scenarios has strict requirements. Therefore, how to design a docking robot mechanism to achieve accurate docking between vehicles has become a challenge.

In this paper, first, the docking mechanism system is described, and the inverse kinematics model of the docking robot based on Stewart is established. Second, the genetic algorithm-based optimization method for multiobjective parameters of parallel mechanisms including workspace volume and mechanism flexibility is proposed to solve the problem of multiparameter optimization of parallel mechanism and realize the docking of unmanned vehicle space flexibility. The optimization results verify that the structural parameters meet the design requirements. Besides, the static and dynamic finite element analysis are carried out to verify the structural strength and dynamic performance of the docking robot according to the stiffness, strength, dead load and dynamic performance of the docking robot. Finally, taking the docking robot as the experimental platform, experiments are carried out under different working conditions, and the experimental results verify that the docking robot can achieve accurate docking tasks.

Experiments on the docking robot that the proposed design and optimization method has a good effect on structural strength and control accuracy. The experimental results verify that the docking robot mechanism can achieve accurate docking tasks, which is expected to provide technical guidance and reference for unmanned vehicles docking technology.

This research can provide technical guidance and reference for spatial docking task of unmanned vehicles under the ground conditions. It can also provide ideas for space docking missions, such as space simulator docking.

To present work and characterisation results from a project to develop a pluggable optical connector for board to board interconnect.

An optical backplane connection system is described, which allows for repeatable docking and undocking of an active optical interface housed on a daughtercard to waveguides fabricated on an optical backplane.

The optical backplane connection system described has demonstrated its successful implementation with respect to optical data transfer across multimode polymer waveguides. Measurement results presented show that such a system is a viable approach toward the application of pluggable optical backplane interconnects.

The direct connection to the exposed waveguide interface results in considerable optical loss and scattering. Future designs will have to address this. Additional work should also be undertaken to develop a means of connector engagement that is autonomous and requires no user intervention.

Prior research into the problem of coupling to an optical backplane has been concerned with interfaces that deflect optical signals by 90° into and out of the waveguides. Here, an alternative approach is proposed that launches light directly into the waveguide ends.