Overview

This workspace is designated for robot assisted and ultrasound guided project.

Packages Descriptions

1. ur5_control:
2. active_echo_serial:
3. virtual_vein:
4. dynamic_reconfig:
5. sensor_description:

User Guide

The current packages are compatible with ROS Hydro/Indigo. Compatibility with other ROS versions are yet to be tested.

For ROS Indigo users, you will want to first install UR5 dependent packages from ROS-Industrial sudo apt-get install ros-indigo-ur-driver ros-indigo-ur-bringup ros-indigo-ur-kinematics ros-indigo-ur-msgs ros-indigo-ur-gazebo ros-indigo-ur-description.

Currently, force feedback is being incorporated into the system and FT150 force torque sensor from Robotiq company is used. One needs to install the rototiq metapackage by 'git clone https://github.com/ros-industrial/robotiq.git ' in your local repository. The EtherCAT soem library is required to build the Robotiq package 'sudo apt-get install ros-indigo-soem'.

Simulation Mode

In order to run the simulation mode, one needs the ursim-3.1 software package provided the Universal Robots Company acquired by Teradyne company.

1. For simulation mode, find the package ursim-3.1 and type in ./start-ursim.sh in terminal. This will bring up the Universal Robots Graphical Programming Environment(URGPE).

2. In another terminal, type ifconfig and copy the IP address which will be something like inet addr: 10.162.43.10. This is the "simulated IP address"of URGPE.

3. In a thrid terminal, type roslaunch ur_bringup ur5_bringup.launch robot_ip:=10.162.43.10 to connect ROS with URGPE.

4. In a fourth terminal, go to the catkin_ws and source devel/setup.bash. Then roslaunch ur5_control ur5.launch to launch the Rviz with UR5 and the ultrasound sensor attached as the end-effector.

5. In a fifth terminal, rosrun active_echo_serial segment_pose_publisher.

6. In a sixth terminal, rosrun active_echo_serial segment_iamge.

7. In a seventh terminal, rostopic pub -r 10 /active_echo_data active_echo_serial/Num "l_all: 256 l_ta: 60 dly:2000 tc:10".

8. In an eigth termina, rosrun rqt_reconfigure rqt_reconfigure.

Real Robot Mode

Be aware of the type of the probe attached as the end-effector of the robot. Currently, there are two types of US probes available: one is 3 mm small linear probe and the other is 6 cm larger linear probe.(To be determined on 02/25/2016)

1. For real robot mode, bring up the UR5 and connect it to the workstation with the ethernet cable.

2. In the UR5 teach pendant, go to Setup Robot and click Setup Network. Next, set up the network connection in Ubuntu (Linux). Use the Default gateway of UR5 as the Address under the IPv4 Settings. Take the ROS tutorial for universal_robot for an example Getting Started with a Universal Robot and ROS-Industrial, then Address = 192.168.1.1,Netmask = 255.255.255.0 and Gateway = 192.168.1.2. Note that DHCP is preferred when both UR5 and workstation are connected to the same local network. If UR5 and workstation are connected directly using an ethernet cable, then it is better to ste the Static Address of UR5 manually.

3. Connect the Control Unit board and the designated workstation using an FTDI cable.

Ultrasound Machine & Active Echo System

1. Turn on the US machine first, and open the SONIX software. In B-Gemo, decrease the ine density to 128. In Sync, set the trigger out A to be 1 and trigger out B to be 2. In Image Mode, set it to be general. Select only one focus and put it on the active echo point.

2. Turn on the power deck for the receiver. Set the voltages to be +5 and -5. One can also push the recall button to reuse the setting from last time.

3. Turn on the transmitter by switching the nob, and push the three black buttons in the middle counted from the right side.

4. Connect the FTDI cable first to a Windows based computer to see the correctness of the serial port output. Note that one should set the baud rate to be 912600.

Current Problems

For detailed problems, please refer to each individual ROS package.

Serial communication via termios in Ubuntu14.04 doesn't work. open_port cannot open the serial port ttyUSB0.

When the serial communication works (in Ubuntu 12.04 on Mac), roslaunch ur5_control ur5.launch and rosrun active_echo_serial active_echo_serial will cause rviz to crash.Current test shows that the rate at which active_echo_serial/Num is published is not the cause of the issue.

Ignore the active data when the count number is zero. Fix the vertical motion of the robot. Try to maximize the count number instead of using the Gaussian distribution to serve as the position feedback control law.

To be continued.