Robotics Final Project: Robot Arm Control Pipeline

Overview

This project is a control pipeline for a Locobot, which works in the following steps:

1. Look around the environment and detect objects using its camera.
2. Grasp objects with its robotic arm.
3. Move the object to a specified target area.
4. Return to the starting position and resume scanning for new objects.

File Structure

We worked across three main Python scripts:

1. detect_objects.py:

   • This script handles the camera feed and object detection. The robot looks around by panning and tilting its camera until it detects a predefined object (e.g., a red cube). Once an object is detected, it triggers the grasping and movement functions. After grasping and placing the object, it continues to look around for a new object. It also handles the bulk of the code and interacts with the functions from the other scripts so at launch

2. move_robot_arm.py:

   • This script controls the robot arm's movement using MoveIt. It contains functions to open and close the gripper, lower the arm to grasp an object, and move the arm to a home position or target location.

3. locobot_teleop.py:

   • This script provides moves the robot by publishing to the /locobot/mobile_base/commands/velocity topic. It allows the robot to turn 90 degrees to the left or right, or forward and is used to move the robot to the target areas.

Running the Code

To run the project, follow these steps:

1. Set up the Environment

Use the following command to run the simulation first.

roslaunch locobot_moveit xslocobot_moveit.launch

Once Gazebo is running, make sure to "start" the simulation by pressing the play button so move it can be used for planning and executing.

2. Run the detection code

in another terminal run the following command to run the python code:

python detect_objects.py