Version 1.0, August 31, 2001, Copyright, Hugh Jack 1993-2001
Dual manipulator cooperation is an interesting concept that allows maximum use of the manipulators. When a payload is encountered that is too heavy, or bulky, for a single manipulator, a second manipulator may be used in unison with the first. I.H.Suh and K.G.Shin [1989] have developed some of the theoretical requirements for two manipulators to carry a single large object. This is done through assigning one manipulator as the leader, and the second as the follower. To overcome the problem caused by the limited degrees of freedom, their method allows one manipulator to 'slide' with respect to the other during the carrying process. If two 6 degree of freedom manipulators were to try and carry a piece together they would find limits. By allowing one manipulator to slide, it is equivalent to adding 1 degree of freedom to the system.
A paper on optimal arm configurations is given by S.Lee [1989]. A method is discussed for identifying optimal dual arm control based on manipulability ellipsoids. This is a lengthy paper outlining all of the details of the method.