In this thesis, the manipulation issue is investigated for a wheelchair-mounted rehabilitation service robot called KARES(KAist Rehabilitation Engineering Service system). The robot system has been realized to help the disabled / the elderly. One of the most important factors to be considered in the design of this system is to enhance reliability so that the disabled / the elderly can use with feelings of safety and confidence. For enhancing the reliability, it is suggested that autonomous manipulation and manual manipulation be integrated in a proper manner.
The basic autonomous tasks for KARES are grasping an object on the table, grasping an object on the floor, and manipulating a switch on the wall. For manual manipulation of the disabled / the elderly, a 3D input device called SPACEBALL 2003 is introduced and an auxiliary device is designed for the disabled to facilitate rotational input function. Using this auxiliary device and SPACEBALL 2003, the disabled / the elderly are able to make a manual adjustment during the autonomous task. Integration of autonomous and manual operation proves to be robust and reliable. The performance of the system is verified by experiment.
