Forward and inverse kinematic analyses of a developed and evaluated bricklaying gantry-based parallel robot manipulator

Gantry robots are still used in wide application areas, especially pick and place applications. However, their kinematic modeling is associated with transforming positions and velocitiesin several base frames to each other. Generally, there are two types of kinematics as regards position, forward (direct) kinematics and inverse kinematics. Forward kinematics deals with determing the position (spot/location) and orientation of the end-effector while given the joint variables. Thus, the inverse kinematics is associated with finding the joint variables while given the position and orientation of the end-effector. Hence, this research presents a study in the field of forward and inverse kinematics modeling on the aforementioned robot through an attempt to provide a better solution enhancing kinematics simplicity. In this study, mathematical functions and equations were used, including the likes of algebra, trigonometry, geometry and a knowledge of motion mechanics was also applied. This study used a two-method kinematic analysis procedure for the forward kinematics. The results shows a range of values for the displacements and orientation of the links. Two experimental procedures gave a maximum difference of 0.03rad/s and 0.47rad using the first setup and 0.001rad/s and 0.016rad using the second setup, in the displacement and orientation of the links respectively. The inverse kinematics gave a displacent result of A(5mm), B(8.61mm), and C(7mm) and orientation of A' (71.53^0), B(90.11^0) and C' (125.61^0).