modularbots_fraunhofer

This repository contains a few instances of ModularBot models, which replicate the output of our automatic discovery tool as applied to the corresponding ModularBot topologies.

Running the simulation

Given a particular configuration of choice (say ModularBot_6DOF), the simulation environment is executed as follows:

• [terminal #1] run the simulator
  • mon launch ModularBot_6DOF ModularBot_gazebo.launch (or roslaunch if you haven't installed its better sibling ros-$ROS_DISTRO-rosmon :P)
• [terminal #2] run xbot2 (attaches to simulation time)
  • xbot2-core --simtime --config $(rospack find ModularBot_6DOF)/config/ModularBot.yaml

Running the hardware

On the real robot, the following steps must be followed:

• release the emergency stop and wait 5 seconds.
• [terminal #1] run the EtherCat master (starts the boards)
  • ecat_master
  • wait for it to stop printing
  • [terminal #2] run xbot2 (starts motors in impedance mode)
  • xbot2-core --hw ec_imp --config $(rospack find ModularBot_6DOF)/config/ModularBot.yaml

To connect to the robot with uncontrolled motors (read-only mode), change the --hw flag to --hw ec_idle. Note that this will stop the motors if needed.

Monitoring & playing with joint sliders

• Run the xbot2-gui command inside a terminal
• Enable the ros_ctrl plugin (left panel)
• Make sure reference filtering is enabled (top panel) and set to safe
• Enable the slider panel (top right panel) and move the joint sliders

More on joint space control can be found at our examples repository.

Cartesian control

Run CartesIO after making sure that the ros_ctrl plugin is active:

mon launch ModularBot_6DOF ModularBot_cartesio_IK.launch

Then, use RViz interactive markers or the Python/C++ API to send references to CartesIO's ROS API (see the tuturial).