After you have modeled your work cell in Model Mode, you can create a set of pre-planned robotic motions, specifically the robot’s configurations and the paths connecting them, in Roadmap Mode. The robotic motions are checked for possible collisions during runtime.
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Toolbar Overview
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Target
Used to add a target, which is a node in a roadmap with a position and orientation that a robot end-effector should be able to reach.
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A target is a fixed point in space, not a robot joint configuration.
Targets should stay away from the axis limits of the robot by a minimum 2 degrees.
Update a Target
You can move the location of an existing target to that of the current TCP.
With a robot’s Jog Dialog open and the TCP in the desired new location, select the target to be moved, then click the Update button (which changes from Add when you select the target to be moved).
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Sequence
A sequence, or a target sequence, is a list of targets, listed in an order that the robot can follow. Target sequences are specific to a particular robot and its preset.
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You can double-click on the target sequence name in the Property Tree to display its Target Sequence dialog to add or delete targets, change the order or, in general, make edits to the target sequence.
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Yellow text - Target Sequence text that displays in yellow alerts you to potential issues. Hover your cursor over the text to display more information.
Inspecting a Target Sequence
You can inspect and play the robot motions of the end-to-end path created by a target sequence in the same way you inspect and play robot motions for edges. See the Roadmap Inspector section below.
Auto-Connect for a Target Sequence
The Auto-Connect feature, described in the Connect section below, creates connections for all selected targets indiscriminately, meaning that each target in a group is connected to all the other targets in the group. This is not the desired behavior when creating a target sequence where, for example, target1 should only be connected to target2, target2 should only be connected to target3, and so on.
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NOTE: Only target pairs with no prior connections will get auto-connect generated between them |
Assign
Displays the Target Assignment dialog, where you can identify which robot and which preset to assign the target to, and then choose among the Inverse Kinematic solutions to use to reach that target.
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The assigned IK solution for the first target from the target assignment list, is also the seeded IK solution for the target assignments after the first assigned target.
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Connect
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You can choose to make connections manually, with the Connections Editor, or have RapidPlan Create make them automatically, with Auto-Connect.
Connections Editor
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The Connections Editor displays the Edit Connections dialog, where you can manually configure connections between targets. You can specify whether connections should be Joint or Cartesian for each target.
After the connections have been created, Joint connections display as green lines. Cartesian connections display as purple lines.
Joint Connections and Cartesian Connections
When a robot moves between points in space it uses one of two kinds of interpolation: Joint or Cartesian. In the picture below, the green areas represent the joint space and the TCP represents the cartesian space.
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OK button - After the Apply button is pressed to create a roadmap, click the OK button to confirm and close the dialog.
Auto-Connect
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Auto-connect is a feature that automatically generates collision-free paths around obstacles without the need to set up a lot of specific targets. Auto-connects may generate additional way-points to avoid collisions between target pairs.
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OK - Close the dialog with the settings saved.
Auto-Connect Validity
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On versions prior to 2.7, auto-connections are regenerated when they are re-validated which may result in a new path between targets. In 2.7 the default behavior has changed so that auto-connects are not regenerated when re-validated. If an auto-connect is valid with the previously generated solution it will remain the same, and if it is invalid it will be indicated as invalid. To regenerate an auto-connect, a user must choose to remove the invalid solution and re-validate. |
After defining the parameters of an auto-connect as outlined above, you must
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If a solution has already been generated for an auto-connect, validating will only check for validity. A valid auto-connect edge is indicated as green in the canvas. If an entire auto-connect is valid it will be indicated as black in the property tree. If an auto-connect has any invalid edges it will be red in the property tree and the invalid edges are indicated as red in the canvas.
Making changes which may impact auto-connect validity -
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Auto-connects with a solution that is not yet validated or has some edges which are not yet validated it will appear grey in the property tree and will have edges in the canvas that are yellow to indicate those with unknown validity. If a solution has already been generated for an auto-connect, validating will only check for validity.
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Regenerating an auto-connect - To remove a solution, right click on the auto-connect and select “Remove Auto-Connect Solution”. Validating an auto-connect without a solution will generate a solution.
Routes
A route is a named, predefined path to navigate between a pair of targets, which includes the smoothing applied at each way-points between the targets.
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Route validity in the inspect tool and property tree are the same as auto-connects. To isolate only routes in the canvas view while inspecting, select “routes” and “deselct” edges in visibility settings.
Measure Tool
You can measure the distance between any two items in the 3D View by clicking on them. The Measure dialog box can display minimum (straight-line) distance and dimension-wise (Dx, Dy, and Dz) distance between the two items. In addition, the Measure dialog box can display the Rotational Offset (Rx, Ry, and Rz), if applicable. The user can select between different modes for measuring said distance:
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The Measure tool can display other measurement information such as distance between parallel surfaces, relative plane angles, and total area.
Jog
Preset
The Robot preset dialog exposes the same dialog box for Preset as it is in Model mode. In Roadmap mode, the dialog will allow users to perform only operations restricted to:
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To learn more robot dynamics under the preset dialog, please refer to the Robot Dynamics section in the Model Mode documentation of RapidPlan Create.
Inspect
For QA and debugging purposes it is necessary to have some way to validate generated edges. You should be able to see if a robot collides with obstacles while moving through a given edge.
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Visualize robots in collision
Visualize robot voxelization
Visualize connections by validity state (invalid, in progress/unknown, valid) and by connection type (Cartesian or Joint)
Display edge paths as connections or according to the motion of the TCP
Play and pause robots motion with adjustable speeds along edges
Visualize intersecting voxels between multiple robots
Play complete target sequence motions
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Roadmap Inspector - Typical sequence of operation
Click on the Inspect button in the toolbar to display the Roadmap Inspector.
Click on a robot in the list or on the canvas. (If you click directly on an edge in the canvas, the robot will be automatically selected for you.)
Select a path to inspect using one of these methods:
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For a target sequence, the robot will move along the targets in the defined order end to end, forward and backward.
Visualizing Robot Paths
There are a number of ways in which you can display the edges, paths, voxels, robot motion speed, etc. based on your settings in the Roadmap Inspector dialog. Below are descriptions of the dialog elements and examples of setting options.
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Edge Color - Validity State - Display edges according to the validity of their connections:
Legend - Invalid: Red connections.
Legend - In progress/Unknown: Yellow connections.
Legend - Valid: Green connections.
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Edge Color - Connection Type - Display edges colored by their type: purple for Cartesian; green for Joint.
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Motion Voxels - Gray voxels showing the swept volume and robot dilation along the motion path.
Intersecting Voxels - Red voxels indicate where the motions of two or more robots would collide following the planned paths.
Edges - Color coordinated: Invalid, In progress/Unknown, Valid
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Auto-play motions - Check to start playing motions immediately after edges, targets, or target sequences are selected for each robot.
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Speed Factor - Drag the slider to adjust the speed of robots. This affects all the robots in the list. Use the numeric spin box for more granular control.
Collision
The Collision drop-down menu allows user to:
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Both the options above can be accessed from the property tree in roadmap mode.
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Clearance
Also known as Clearance Rules in the Property Tree, Clearance option in the tool bar allows to specify a minimum clearance rule when path planning. The rule applies to a robot/preset’s roadmap (or part of the roadmap). These sets of rules, which are user-defined, are taken into consideration during path planning.
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NOTE:
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Validate
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When switching from model to roadmap mode, everything is set to a state of unknown validity. |
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Revalidate All - Validates all edges.
Export
The Export button generates the different CAD files needed for the current project. The project is compressed to a .zip file and saved under the same project folder.
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