Impedance Control of Ship-Borne Manipulators via Optimization-based Task-Space Inverse Dynamics

Abstract:Ship-borne manipulators operating in maritime environments are subject to stochastic wave-induced base motions that introduce kinematic disturbances and dynamic coupling, degrading trajectory tracking accuracy and complicating safe, contact-rich manipulation. This paper proposes a torque-level optimization-based control framework that integrates high-precision trajectory tracking with task-space impedance for ship-borne manipulators. The controller is formulated using task-space inverse dynamics (TSID) and solved via quadratic programming to explicitly compensate for the dynamic coupling introduced by base motion. To enable accurate feedforward compensation, an error-state Kalman filter (ESKF) is developed to estimate the base state by fusing inertial measurements with end-effector pose feedback. The framework is validated in simulation and real-world experiments using a 7-DOF manipulator mounted on a 6-DOF Stewart platform. The proposed method reduces real-world end-effector position tracking error by over 25.7% compared with the best baseline. Furthermore, the controller enables dynamic peg-in-hole insertion with 1~mm clearance under base motion, increasing the success rate while reducing average contact forces by 45%, demonstrating precise and compliant manipulation in contact-rich environments.

Robotics (cs.RO)

arXiv:2607.22030 [cs.RO]

(or arXiv:2607.22030v1 [cs.RO] for this version)

https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2607.22030 Focus to learn more arXiv-issued DOI via DataCite (pending registration)

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