Industrial robot having selective teaching modes

Claim 9

An industrial robot having an arm driven by a motor, comprising: manually operated mode entry means for selecting one of first, second and third teaching modes; means for generating a signal representative of the path to be traced by said arm; means for sampling said path representative signal at a higher sampling rate when said first teaching mode is selected to produce a first train of samples and sampling said path representative signal at a lower sampling rate when said second and third teaching modes are selected to produce a second train of samples; means for interpolating a sample between successive samples of said second train during said second teaching mode and combining the interpolated sample with the samples of said second train to derive a third train of samples, and approximating samples from successive samples of said second train during said third teaching mode; and means for controlling said motor in response to said first, third and fourth trains of samples.

Claim 10

An industrial robot having an arm driven by a motor, comprising: manually operated mode entry means for selecting one of first, second and third teaching modes; means for generating a signal representative of the path to be traced by said arm; means for sampling said path representative signal at a higher sampling rate when said first teaching mode is selected to produce a first train of samples and sampling said path representative signal at a lower sampling rate when said second and third teaching modes are selected to produce a second train of samples; means for interpolating a sample between successive samples of said second train during said second teaching mode and combining the interpolated sample with the samples of said second train to derive a third train of samples, and approximating samples from successive samples of said second train during said third teaching mode; and means for controlling said motor in response to said first, third and fourth trains of samples.

Claim 11

An industrial robot as claimed in claim 5, wherein said entry means includes means for generating first, second and third flags corresponding respective to said first, second and third teaching modes, further comprising: means for forming said first flag and said first train samples into a first data set, forming said second flag and said second train samples into a second data set and forming said third flag and said second train samples into a third data set; a memory for storing said first, second and third data sets; and means for addressing the stored data sets in said memory and decoding the flags of the addressed data sets and selectively causing said interpolating and approximating means to perform interpolation and approximation, respectively, on the samples contained in the addressed data sets in accordance with the decoded flags.

Claim 12

An industrial robot as claimed in claim 5, wherein said position signal genernating means comprises a memory storing a quadratic position signal representative of the position of said arm in a quadratic coordinate system, and wherein said sampling means comprises means for reading said stored signal to generate said first and second trains of samples.

Claim 13

An industrial robot having an arm driven by a plurality of motors about X, Y and Z axes, comprising: manually operated mode entry means for selecting one of first, second and third teaching modes; a plurality of position encoder means associated respectively with said motors for generating X, Y and Z angular position signals respectively representative of the angular positions of said arm about said X, Y and Z axes in a three-dimensional polar coordinate system; polar-to-quadratic coordinate translating means for translating said X, Y and Z angular position signals respectively into X, Y and Z quadratic position signals in a three-dimensional quadratic coordinate system; means for sampling said X, Y and Z quadratic position signals at a higher rate when said first teaching mole is selected to produce a first train of samples for each of the X, Y and Z axes of said quadratic coordinate system and sampling said X, Y and Z quadratic position signals at a lower rate when said second and third teaching modes are selected to produce a second train of samples for each of the quadratic coordinates; means for interpolating a sample between successive samples of said second train during said second teaching mode and combining the interpolated sample with the samples of said second train to derive a third train of samples, and approximating samples from successive samples of said second train during said third treaching mode to derive a fourth train of samples; quadratic-to-polar coordinate translating means for translating the first, third and fourth trains of samples into trains of samples represented by said polar coordinate system; and means for controlling said motor in repsonse to the output of said quadratic-to-polar coordinate translating means.

Claim 14

An industrial robot having an arm driven by a plurality of motors about X, Y and Z axes, comprising: manually operated mode entry means for selecting one of first, second and third teaching modes; a plurality of position encoder means associated respectively with said motors for generating X, Y and Z angular position signals respectively representative of the angular positions of said arm about said X, Y and Z axes in a three-dimensional polar coordinate system; polar-to-quadratic coordinate translating means for translating said X, Y and Z angular position signals respectively into X, Y and Z quadratic position signals in a three-dimensional quadratic coordinate system; means for sampling said X, Y and Z quadratic position signals at a higher rate when said first teaching mole is selected to produce a first train of samples for each of the X, Y and Z axes of said quadratic coordinate system and sampling said X, Y and Z quadratic position signals at a lower rate when said second and third teaching modes are selected to produce a second train of samples for each of the quadratic coordinates; means for interpolating a sample between successive samples of said second train during said second teaching mode and combining the interpolated sample with the samples of said second train to derive a third train of samples, and approximating samples from successive samples of said second train during said third treaching mode to derive a fourth train of samples; quadratic-to-polar coordinate translating means for translating the first, third and fourth trains of samples into trains of samples represented by said polar coordinate system; and means for controlling said motor in repsonse to the output of said quadratic-to-polar coordinate translating means.

Claim 15

An industrial robot as claimed in claim 8, wherein said entry means includes menas for generating first, second and third flags corresponding respectively to said first, second and third teaching modes, further comprising: means for forming said first flag and said first train samples into a first data set, forming said second flag and said second train samples into a second data set and forming said third flag and said second train samples into a third data set; a memory for storing therein said first, second and third data sets; and means for addressing the stored data sets in said memory and decoding the flags of the addressed data sets and selectively causing said interpolating and approximating means to perform interpolation and approximation, respectively, on the samples contained in the addressed data sets in accordance with the decoded flags.