VIRTUAL FIXTURES AND AUTOMATIC MODE SWITCHING FOR TELEOPERATION TASKS

In this work a novel command strategy is presented for teleoperating a mobile-Manipulator system. To test its effectiveness, the command: strategy was implemented on the mobile-manipulator system "Omnibot MMS", The Omnibot MMS is teleoperated using a three degree-of-freedom haptic joystick and is controlled by driving either the base or the manipulator using an intuitive,automatic mode switching command Strategy, Virtual fixtures are used, to provide additional information to the operator about the configuration of the Omnibot MMS, as well as increase accuracy and decrease errors. Through testing it was shown that new operators increased performance faster using the novel command strategy, and both accuracy and efficiency were improved, when compared to the traditional method of control using two joysticks.