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Additive manufacturing (AM) technologies have been widely used to fabricate three-dimensional (3D) objects quickly and cost-effectively. However, building parts consisting of complex geometries with curvatures can be a challenging process for the traditional AM system whose capability is restricted to planar layered printing. Using six degrees-of-freedom (DOF) industrial robots for AM overcomes this limitation by allowing the material deposition to take place on nonplanar surfaces. In this paper, we present trajectory planning algorithms for 3D printing using nonplanar material deposition. Trajectory parameters are selected to avoid collision with printing surface and satisfy robot constraints. We have implemented our approach by using a 6DOF robot arm. The complex 3D structures with various curvatures were successfully fabricated with a good surface finish.

Additive manufacturing (AM) technologies have been widely used to fabricate 3D objects quickly and cost-effectively. However, building parts consisting of complex geometries with multiple curvatures can be a challenging process for the traditional AM system whose capability is restricted to planar-layered printing. Using 6-DOF industrial robots for AM overcomes this limitation by allowing materials to deposit on non-planar surfaces with desired tool orientation. In this paper, we present collision-free trajectory planning for printing using non-planar deposition. Trajectory parameters subject to surface curvature are properly controlled to avoid any collision with printing surface. We have implemented our approach by using a 6-DOF robot arm. The complex 3D structures with various curvatures were successfully fabricated, while avoiding any failures in joint movement, holding comparable build time and completing with a satisfactory surface finish.

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We present an approach to generate path-constrained synchronous motion for the coupled ensemble of robots. In this article, we refer to serial-link manipulators and mobile bases as robots. We assume that the relative motion constraints among the objects in the environment are given. We represent the motion constraints as path constraints and pose the problem of path-constrained synchronous trajectory generation as a non-linear optimization problem. Our approach generates configuration space trajectories for the robots to manipulate the objects such that the given motion constraints among the objects are satisfied. We present a method that formulates the problem as a discrete parameter optimization problem and solves it using successive constraint refinement techniques. The method adaptively selects the parametric representation of the configuration variables for a given scenario. It also generates an approximate solution as the starting point for the successive constraint refinement stages to reduce the computation time. We discuss in detail why successive constraint refinement strategies are useful for solving this class of problems. We demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed method on challenging test cases in simulation and physical environments with high-degree-of-freedom robotic systems.

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