Force Control with a Kalman Active Observer Applied in a Robotic Skill Transfer System *

The article describes the design of a force controller for a position-based manipulator with arbitrary dead-time applying Kalman Active Observers. The design is based on pole placement using discrete state space theory. An active state variable is introduced to compensate non linearities and parameter variations during the control process. Only the output of the plant is measured. All the discrete state space is estimated using Kalman based techniques. The robustness of the system is accomplished through optimal noise processing embedded in the control strategy. The design was tested as a force controller in a skill transfer system at the DLR.